Trini Parsons—Cancer Scare Strengthens Connection to God

Trini Parsons has seen her share of women with breast cancer. As an x-ray technologist at Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, that's hardly surprising. But in the summer of 2005, she came across a cancer patient in an unusual place—her own mirror.

What Parsons has learned about herself since then has been enlightening. “I am much more upbeat,” she says. “I don't let things get me down. I am much calmer about many things.”

MISSED MAMMOGRAMS
Parsons's story started a couple of years ago in Ireland. She and her husband, Bob, were living there to be closer to his family and to “take a break from everything.” During that time, Parsons stopped getting regular mammograms. Not by choice, exactly, but because under Ireland's socialized medicine program, mammograms are not routinely done for women younger than 50.

Still, she wasn't worried. She was doing monthly breast self-exams and knew it wouldn't be long before she was back in the United States. But when they finally returned, there was so much to do—finding a place to live, finding the right job—that getting a breast cancer screening was at the bottom of her to-do list.

After about nine months, she started working at Saint Alphonsus as an interpreter. (Parsons, now 47, was born in Spain and originally moved to the U.S. when she was 27.) In June 2005, a job opened up for an x-ray technologist. By July, she finally decided it was time for that mammogram.

What the screening found was not encouraging.

DISTURBING RESULTS
“There was an area that looked really very nasty, and everyone thought that was the cancer,” Parsons says. That was a Friday afternoon. A biopsy was scheduled for Monday. “I remember calling my husband on the way home. When I told him, ‘I think I have breast cancer,' he started crying and got very emotional,” she says. "Saturday was pretty tough."

“I sat in a rocking chair thinking, ‘This could be it,'” she says. “I mean, you see yourself buried and dead.” Then something wonderful happened.

DIVINE HELP
“I just felt it in my body,” Parsons says. “I just felt that, ‘It's OK. You are going to be OK. God has taken care of you so far, and he is going to take care of you when you die, so why are you worrying?'”

She told her husband that her fears were behind her. By Monday, she was upbeat, laughing and cracking jokes. When the biopsy was done, doctors had good news and not-so-good news. First, the area that looked so scary on the mammogram wasn't cancer at all—just a common, benign tumor. On the other hand, doctors did find cancer cells in the biopsied tissue.

Even so, the cancer was in the earliest stages, meaning Parsons could avoid radiation or chemotherapy and instead take a hormone suppressor, tamoxifen. She now goes in for regular checkups. And if there are no problems in five years, she'll be in the clear.

BLESSINGS IN DISGUISE
As frightening as the experience was, Parsons says there were blessings too. For example, she learned firsthand how caring and supportive her Saint Alphonsus co-workers are.

“The best part is discovering all these friends, feeling the love of people and how supportive they can be,” she says. “I cannot say enough about these women.” She also finds that she now has a closer rapport with other cancer patients. “I've had some experience in desperation and frustration and all these things,” she says. “I can help some people.”

Parsons's advice? Get regular mammograms, don't stress about unimportant things and keep God in your life.

“Don't stop talking to God,” she says, “because He is there. He is listening to you.”