A pregnant women who was diagnosed with a cancerous tumor ignored her doctor’s advice to get an abortion so he could operate on her. Relying on her Catholic faith, 21-year-old Daniella Jackson chose to give birth. Now she is cancer-free and has a health, happy baby girl.
The London Daily Mail has the story of this profile in courage:
Doctors told Miss Jackson, who has never smoked a cigarette in her life, that they urgently needed to remove the 4cm-long tumor – a type usually found in people over 60. However, medics at Nottingham City Hospital refused to operate while she was expecting and told her to terminate her pregnancy to save herself.
But Miss Jackson, a devout Catholic from Aspley, Nottingham, refused and gave birth to a healthy baby daughter.
Four weeks later, she was able to have the life-saving operation to remove half her lung. Now both mother and daughter Rennae, four months, are cancer free.
She first saw doctors after experiencing breathing problems and was diagnosed with asthma. But after a CT scan, a carcinoid tumor was discovered – a genetic type of cancer usually only found in the elderly. Towards the end of her pregnancy, Miss Jackson was battling daily asthma attacks and could not lie on her left-hand side due to the tumor.
“I was always determined to have my baby. I felt such a close bond with her, I couldn’t let her go,” Jackson told the newspaper.
“‘I couldn’t lie down on my left-hand side because it hurt so much,” she added. “I thought it was the end for me and my baby. I felt like a ticking time bomb and I had nightmares about dying in labor. It was a bad time, my head was all over the place. I just shut down and tried to get through as best as I could.”
“I’m just so thankful I have a future with my children and I’m surviving,” she concluded.
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