A f f i r m

Did I tell you I was baptized last year? On my first anniversary, I did an affirmation before my congregation that I want to share with y’all. Hello everyone. My name is Pamela. Most of you know me as “the girl with cancer”. I won’t deny it. There is about a ping pong size of a cancerous tumor residing in my brain; around the tip of my brain stem, behind my throat. It is in its stage four. Meaning it has progressed through stages 1 through 3. There is no stage five. In other words, it is an aggressive tumor. But today’s affirmation is not about the tumor. I will not give the tumor anymore narrative than I have. This story is about me, my family, and my God. This is about how I found my God, my family and myself in the midst of this journey we all call life.

In 1983, the year my paternal grandfather passed away. I was born Chao-Yun Wu, to Hsih-chien Wu, a tall college grad city slicker, and Lih-mei Huang, a dark skinned nature loving girl from the country side. My sister Theresa Chao-Wen Wu exactly twelve months before my arrival, became the first addition to the Wu family. I was delivered to my parents at MacKay Memorial Hospital in Taipei after my mom felt contractions while attending a mass on Christmas Eve. I was born on Christmas day, December 25, 1983 at 7 in the morning. By all accounts, I had a very conventional up bringing. I was a girl scout, I went through normal elementary school and after school tutors like any other big city kid in the booming 90s. I was never a good student, often being punished for being too out spoken. I played the piano; excelled at is but lost the music at boarding school. Theresa and I left Taiwan fairly naively at the tender age of 14 and 13 for Canada’s west coast. Growing up relatively sheltered, we were in unfamiliar territory. After high school, Theresa left Canada for California and I settled into the cold weather of Toronto for college. Four years after the beginning of college, I graduated and followed my big sister to the Big Apple, looking to be apart of this new and vibrant city that is New York. Which led me to my husband, Lemin. Lemin and I met one cold December wintry night at Theresa’s birthday at Otto. He had been Theresa’s then-boyfriend now-husband’s friend. We barely spoke to each other throughout dinner, even though his friends made him sit right across from me. And the rest as they say is history. We had the most scenic wedding on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. A couple months prior to the wedding I recall a conversation with Lemin in his car. I foretold him that I would become a Christian one day. I can’t say I know much about this religion. I wasn’t sure why I had brought it up with Lemin. I remember tracing my roots to him, that I recall riding in my parents’ beatup grey honda civic and dropping off my dad at church on top of a hill every sunday. And my grandmother’s diligent bible reading, the wood cross that hung near the entrance to her house so gallantly displayed, of my uncle and aunt’s devotion in their lives. Lemin responded that he will honor my decision. Fast forward to March 16, 2014. Last year tomorrow. My first birthday, March 16, 2014. The day I was reborn into this world. I am pleasantly surprised to be standing before Our Father so soon. I don’t profess to be wiser. I am not a whole lot kinder. But I am aware of the workings of God. I know this is a challenge, a task if you will. That I will learn to repent my sins. That I will learn His existence and ways. He also gave me tools to navigate through this challenge. God gave me the the best possible co-pilot in my husband Lemin, or shall I say designated pilot. Whose patience and detail-driven temperance has found care for me through our medical challenges. My husband’s job as a real estate agent meant he is able to be my full time care person when I was incapacitated. For that I am grateful.

God also gave me Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, without which I clearly would have had a very different and difficult journey. I remember signing up in October of 2013, right when President Obama was plugging the overhaul of America’s healthcare system. By December my symptoms had progressed to not being able to walk straight. Come January, when universal healthcare kicked into affect, I received my diagnosis and was able to commence treatment seamlessly. Since I am unemployed, Lemin and I were both uninsured before Obamacare; without which it is likely we would be left in financial ruins from the medical bills. For that I am grateful. God gave me this tumor, a Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), the most aggressive malignant primary brain tumor the symptoms of which is seizure. Yet because of the location of my tumor, not in the cerebral hemispheres, I have not had debilitating seizures. GBM is also a primary tumor. Meaning that it is unlikely to grow somewhere else. Though tumors located in the middle of the brainstem cannot be surgically removed, I believe that having received this diagnosis at my age of 30 rather than younger, as brain stem gliomas occur almost exclusively in children, I know my odds, with modern day medicine and my ability to tolerate them, fare better. For that I am grateful. God gave me my parents, whose fateful decision to send Theresa and I abroad has made everything that is who I am possible. They have made the telling of this story possible. Today, their support thousands of miles away have been unwavering in the face of immense obstacles. For that I am grateful.

God gave me my mother Teresa, in my sister Theresa, whose take charge and no none-sense personality, although in deep contrast with my husband’s, compliments each other so well she is my left leg if Lemin was my right. For that I am grateful.

God sent me angels of hope through communities at hospitals, writing workshops, art lessons, and most importantly my fellow congregation at church. I recall visiting small clinics without insurance in October and November of 2013 trying to figure out the reason for my numbing face. Sensation on the left side of my face gradually disappeared, which meant my left nostril, left ear, left forehead, left tongue etc. To this day, I still don’t feel anything on my left side. At these visits to clinics, not one doctor was able to tell me what was wrong with me. On one visit to a non-for-profit clinic in Chinatown, a Dr. Zhao told me that he thinks its either labyrinthitis or a tumor. Oh how I hoped it was labyrinthitis. But that doctor’s visit prompted me to go to Bellevue emergency for a scan of my brain. Which led me to my diagnosis. For that I am grateful. You ask me: Isn’t this all a coincidence? My answer is: No. It is not. Because I choose to live in the world where God exists. I choose his Gospel and choose to see his workings. Without it this life is colorless: without stories, without beliefs, without miracles. With this renewed interpretation of life through Christ our savior, I am learning about appreciation and gratitude. To see every aspect of my life as fuel to this journey. For instance to see social media as fuel to get better and stay better. That I may one day be healthy enough to bear a child with my husband like many of my peers have. To be buying a crib for my unborn and not a wheelchair for myself. To be holding the hand of my husband because of the love that exists between us and not because my symptoms robbed me of my ability to walk. That one day I may not see my parents cry because they worry about my illness but that they are happy I am alive. That one day my congregation may no longer see me as the girl with cancer, just a fellow church goer. Are there days I question God’s plan? Why me? Why do I have cancer at 30? What have I done? Of course I have. But in my darkest hour, I choose to live this life with God, through his light, love and benevolence, than to live a life that is filled with unanswerable questions and doubt.

So hello again. It’s me. My name is Pamela. I am living proof that this is not a story about a cure or a miracle. I will admit to having prayed to God for a cure. But I also know that it’s not about these prayers not being answered; for I have already been given the answer. That I have been able to see it all through God’s work is the answer to my prayers. My God has given me an abundance of hope and love in the absence of a cure. He has given me tools to live this renewed life. To see the world with this new outlook on life. My resolve comes from knowing that though I may not have seen Jesus Christ nor God, that I bear witness to His workings on me. I hope I have shown you my faith for I have seen.