Breast cancer survivor never lost faith

Despite doing her best to take precautions by ensuring that she did her mammogram examination every year, it was a simple bruising from a clothing item that led Nadine Fagan Wilson to discover she had stage three breast cancer.

"I had breast trauma, a trauma from the bone of the brassiere. But I usually do my mammogram and PAP smear yearly, but at the time this area was tender. I didn't really tek it serious, it was like I had got a little trauma, you know it will guh weh," Fagan Wilson said.

But the trauma, in the form of a bruise on her right breast, did not go away; instead it quickly got worse. So, in February 2018 she went to do a mammogram. But the results came back negative for cancer. It wasn't until October of that same year, after doing an ultrasound biopsy, that she discovered that she had carcinoma, a form of cancer that forms in the epithelial tissue. After receiving her diagnosis, Fagan Wilson, who has been a nurse at the Bustamante Hospital for Children for 22 years, was so distraught she broke done in tears.

"When they told me that it was cancerous, everything just blacked out. I've been hearing about people having cancer. Cancer, you know when you hear that, you think of death. Sudden death. I didn't take it calmly because I was at work, enuh, and even when they sent me to find out to do a scan, I went to Winchester to find out the date and when I came back my sister was there ... and when she saw me I broke down in tears and she had to comfort me because I couldn't accept it. Sometimes I feel like it's just a dream. How come I end up having that thing (cancer)?" Fagan Wilson said.

But Fagan Wilson, a mother of five adult children, found strength in God as she was not ready to give up. With the support of her family and friends, she decided to battle breast cancer with hope and the belief that she would survive.

"The Lord used people to strengthen me and then I started to pray and left everything to God. After that I just find a relief; the Lord was there all the time," Fagan Wilson said. She added that she had to be strong during this time for her family.

"Whenever a person says or they hear about cancer, they think of death. So their reaction was just down and sad. So me was the strong one with everybody looking down, like they say 'boy, mommy aguh dead'. But I told them to be strong. I strongly gave them the news; I just tell them. I wasn't feeling down or anything," Fagan Wilson said.

Now four years cancer free, Fagan Wilson, 52, wants others to know that breast cancer does not have to be a death sentence. She also encouraged others battling the disease to eat healthy, trust God and keep fighting.

"You have to eat all your fruits and vegetables and make sure you take your medication, and we all have to just hold fast and trust in God because He is a miracle-working God, and He always makes what's impossible, possible, because He has done it for me and I know He will do it for you," she said.