As her only child waged battle against the Big C, she remained a pillar of strength, as she tried to reassure everyone in her family, especially her daughter, that everything would be all right. And what she said and didn’t say—including certain thoughts she kept to herself—all came to pass.
By Alex Y. Vergara
Joanne Golong-Gomez and little Sofia can afford to laugh about it now, including letting us in on their little secret about having cheat days, which could sometimes extend to an entire weekend. But there was a time in the mother-daughter’s life when the situation wasn’t as sunny. And it all began even before the current pandemic cast a pall of gloom all over the world.
It’s no secret among Joanne’s close friends, including those on Facebook, what Sofia, then 11, went through starting late 2019. The outspoken tween with a winsome smile suddenly found herself faced with a life-threatening illness that not even her parents Joanne and Gerry could fully shield her from: a growing tumor on her pituitary gland that later turned out to be cancerous.
After the storm
“I guess the worst for us is over,” says Joanne, a seasoned hotelier who works with Hilton Manila as its director of business development, during an exclusive interview with PeopleAsia over Zoom. It has been a little over a year now since Sofia went through a series of treatments, including laparoscopic operation through her nose to extract a big chunk of the cancerous tumor as well as several sessions of radiation and chemotherapy that continued way into last year’s lockdown to make sure what was left behind stays benign.
“That’s how it is with cancer,” Joanne continues. “You need at least five years of continuous monitoring before you could say with a bit of certainty that you’re now free from it. So far, so good.” Monitoring these days means Sofia has to go to the hospital every three months to undergo blood, liver and kidney screening as well as an MRI scan.
Removing the entire tumor would have been the most logical thing to do, but because it was very near Sofia’s eyes—the pituitary gland is lodged between the base of the brain and behind the eye area—her doctors didn’t resort to such a drastic measure, which, says Joanne, could permanently damage her daughter’s vision.
Often called as the master gland, the pea-sized pituitary gland produces a number of hormones that each affects a specific part of the body. It also controls the functions of most other endocrine glands responsible for a person’s metabolism, growth, sexual maturation, blood pressure and a host of other physical functions and processes.
Because it hardly takes up space in the body, the pituitary gland may seem insignificant, but it also has a lot do with a person’a ability to retain water and keep him or her from feeling thirsty all the time—something that provided Joanne and Gerry with initial clues when they were still in the dark about Sofia’s true condition.
“Sophia’s growth hormone seemed undamaged after all those procedures and treatments,” says Joanne. “Her growth is regularly being monitored to make sure it’s on track with her age.”
Dietary no-nos
But like most cancer survivors, Sofia has been reminded by her doctors to lay off fatty foods, including fast food items usually deep-fried in recycled oil. That means being limited to a diet of “healthy food,” including fresh or slightly blanched veggies and lean meat. And since her body’s metabolic process is not yet fully on the mend, the young girl has also been advised to stay away from sweets and salty food. Now, that could be a major bummer for someone who loves hamburgers and chocolate.
“My Mom is my best friend, but could also be my worse kaaway (enemy),” Sofia says before breaking into giggles. “But I love my Mom because she allows me to have a cheat day, [a day] I can eat and drink whatever is not allowed.” Joanne can only smile before instinctively putting her right index finger on her lips.
Do her doctors know about this? Sofia seems oblivious, as she goes on to share more information that finally reduces her enabler of a mother into stitches.
“During my cheat day, which is usually on a Saturday, I also eat lots of chocolate,” she says, her eyes twinkling naughtily. “Minsan (sometimes), I exceed my cheat day. I still have some snacks on Sunday. When my Mom catches me, she’d go, ay naku, Sofia!”
Sofia, now 12, Joanne and Gerry’s unica hija, has always been a happy child. Like most girls her age, she was living a virtually carefree existence, secure in the love of her doting parents. It was sometime in November 2019 when the family was vacationing in the US that Joanne and Gerry, a businessman dealing in anti-static shoes dubbed as Footsafe, noticed something wrong with their little girl.
She had none of the usual “classic” signs like headaches, blurry vision, bleeding and a deathly pallor that countless cancer-stricken individuals initially manifest or experience. Instead, she experienced an unquenchable thirst that no amount of water intake could seem to fully satisfy. And as a result of her unusual liquid intake, she also had to frequently go to the bathroom to relieve herself. Her parents also later noticed that she was beginning to lose weight.
“It started while we were in the plane [going to the US],” Sofia recalls. “I began drinking lots of water. Unusual amounts of water, which we learned later was probably around nine liters per day.”
Can it be diabetes?
Since diabetes runs in Gerry’s family, Sofia’s parents initially thought that she was suffering from some form of the disease. The first thing she underwent upon their return to the Philippines was a thorough blood test. Her blood sugar turned out normal, but her unquenchable thirst remained.
“That was when we started scouring the Internet to try to find out what was wrong with her,” says Joanne. Based on Sofia’s symptom, their search revealed that she could be suffering from a tumor in the pituitary gland. They lost no time visiting an endocrinologist who recommended that Sofia undergo a new round of tests, including an MRI scan.
The Gomez couple’s hunch proved right. The MRI scan later revealed she indeed had a growing tumor on her pituitary gland. Apart from losing her appetite, Sofia also began having difficulty sleeping.
“We still didn’t know if the tumor was cancerous,” says Joanne. “We thought or were probably wishing na wala lang (that it was nothing), but when the results of the biopsy came out, it was confirmed. The tumor was cancerous!”
Joanne can never forget that day because it coincided with her birthday. Still, for some reason, she remained positive and hopeful that her little girl would be able to pull through. Of the two, it was Gerry, she says, who had a harder time seeing Sofia suffer, especially during the latter stages of the treatment when she started feeling weak and nauseous after every chemotherapy session.
“Gerry told me one time that he felt like he was having an anxiety attack,” says Joanne. “I told him, you can’t have an anxiety attack. Should that happen, dala-dalawa pa kayong aalagaan ko (I’d have to watch over you as well).”
It’s often been said that you’ll never know how strong or how tough you are until you go through the wringer yourself. To this day, Joanne has no clue how she was able to deal with the situation without falling apart herself.
“I’ve always considered myself strong,” she says. “But I never knew I was that strong. Prayers helped a lot.”
Even when Sofia went into a comma for two days resulting from a sodium imbalance immediately after her third chemotherapy, Joanne never questioned God’s plan for them.
“I felt weak, especially when they started feeding her through her nose because she was not conscious,” she says. “When she finally came out of it, her doctors ordered that she immediately undergo a CT scan.” Thank goodness, no damage on Sofia, permanent or otherwise, was found.
The past 2 weeks have been hard, but we never stop believing that all will be well. Answered prayer this Easter Sunday.” This was part of Joanne’s FB post that accompanied this picture last Easter. As she and her family have proven for themselves, in God’s time, all will indeed be well.
A mom’s many concerns
When it was confirmed that Sofia had cancer and would be needing additional treatment after her operation, a million and one concerns raced through Joanne’s head. The mother in her, for instance, was initially worried that Sofia, one of the top students in her Grade 5 class, might fall behind in her lessons, even miss out on advancing to the next grade.
“At the same time, Gerry and I were concerned about how this development could affect her in the long run,” says Joanne. “It was supposed to be a carefree period in a child’s life, and there she was facing a life-threatening disease that, should she survive it, could scar her for life.”
As far as Sofia’s academics were concerned, no such thing happened, as her teachers were extra considerate enough when it came to dealing with her. For instance, she was only tested and graded on topics and chapters she was able to take. Despite being confined from five to seven days every time she underwent chemotherapy, Sofia was able to catch up in school and move on to Grade 6, which, because of the pandemic, is now conducted purely online.
“Through it all, I never saw my mom cry,” says Sofia. “But I could sense that she was hurting.” Joanne’s optimism kept her feeling buoyed. But there was one time, when she nearly lost it. In the end though, she managed to rein her emotions in for her little girl’s sake.
Sofia, apart from exuding positivity, seems to take after her mom’s nerves of steel. “Oh, yeah, I vomited almost all the time,” she says, referring to her dreaded dates with the oncologist on chemotherapy days. “Other than that, I felt okay. I felt that it was a trial that God gave me, and I had to overcome it.” Except during instances when her headache became almost unbearable, Sofia, her mom attests, never complained.
Having also attended to her mother while she was undergoing chemotherapy due to breast cancer some years back, Joanne initially thought that Sofia’s chemotherapy would also be an outpatient procedure. She even floated the idea to the child’s oncologist that she take oral chemotherapy drugs instead. But since she’s still a child, her doctors said she needed to undergo a different protocol, one that would require her to be confined and monitored after every chemo transfusion.
“There was a time, a few weeks into the lockdown, when we had to bring a week’s supply of cooked food with us to the hospital because all the restaurants were closed,” says Joanne. The fear of getting infected with coronavirus while at the hospital was always there. Apart from strictly adhering to all COVID-19 protocols, they stayed almost all the time in their room, which is located on a floor exclusive for cancer patients and their caregivers.
Falling hair
A household staff accompanied them during Sofia’s series of confinements, while Gerry stayed home most of the time to attend to his business and watch over the house. It was during one of these confinements, when Joanne was assisting her daughter take a bath, that they both noticed Sofia’s hair starting to fall off.
After being an epitome of strength, Joanne was on the verge of cracking. “Ewan ko ba. I don’t know what went over me,” she shares. “Bigla akong naawa sa anak ko (I suddenly felt pity for my child).” But when Sofia asked her what was wrong with her hair, Joanne suddenly came to her senses and realized that she had to stay strong for her family’s sake.
“Deep inside, I wanted to cry, but I tried to reassure her that her hair would grow back, more lush and more beautiful than before, in no time,” she says. And it did! True enough, everything Joanne said and didn’t say—including thoughts she merely kept in her heart like her fervent wish for her child to be fully healed—has all come to pass.
