21 years ago, a Melbourne mother Tricia Colman received a devastating cancer diagnosis during her seventh pregnancy. She was offered an abortion but chose life for her child.
It was 2005, and Tricia arrived for her routine 20-week ultrasound. As it was her seventh child, Tricia wanted to know the gender and was happy to be told she was expecting a girl. She barely noticed when the attendant left the room to find the department head.
He came quickly and asked Tricia to get back onto the bed. The two medicos then discussed various tests and their results, and finally the senior man gave Tricia the news: a lump had been found on her kidney.
At first, Tricia saw no cause for alarm. She thought this was a minor development, perhaps just a cyst, and went home unperturbed.
That all changed after a call from her GP, who laid Tricia’s options on the line. She said that the discovery was a serious one — renal cell carcinoma — and that it may come down to saving the life of Tricia or her baby. She reminded Tricia that she had a husband and six other children to care for, yet Tricia was resolute.
“No harm will be done to my baby,” she told her doctor.
Tricia was given her records and referred to one of Monash Health’s hospitals in Melbourne. There, a second ultrasound showed that the lump on her kidney was now a 20 cm mass.
Later that day, when Tricia’s GP called with the results, Tricia jokingly asked her, “Should I get on my knees?”
Her doctor answered sombrely, “Your whole church needs to get on its knees.”
More specialist visits followed: one to a urologist who scheduled a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan. Again, the suggestion of abortion was mentioned and again, Tricia refused. The specialist told her the best path would be to deliver her baby early, and that the Obstetrics Department would want her to wait until 32 weeks.
At this point, the fast-growing tumour weighed more than Tricia’s baby. Most of the tests which would have normally been run at this time, as well as treatment for the cancer, were out of the question due to Tricia’s pregnancy. There was little to be done except praying, waiting — and for Tricia, planning for the arrival of her new baby.
On June 6, baby Imogen was born by caesarean section at 31 weeks, weighing 1.5 kg, while the tumour weighed a massive 1.7 kg! The doctors thought the tumour would have spread by that time and told Tricia she would need another surgery two weeks later to remove her kidney as well as her spleen.
Due to the surgery, medications, testing and recovery period, Tricia was never going to be able to breastfeed. Thankfully, a friend who had also just given birth donated milk to Imogen for three months.
With a lot of family support, Tricia was, over time, able to recover from her surgeries while managing her premature baby and was eventually given the all-clear from her cancer.
Tricia marvels at the fact that she experienced no symptoms from the kidney carcinoma, which is typical for that condition. She says, “I’m so grateful for Imogen because it was only due to the pregnancy that the tumour was detected. Had it not been for my baby, it wouldn’t have been discovered in time and I would not have survived.”
Tricia’s story underscores the fact that abortion is never medically necessary. With good care, some courage and a commitment to preserving the unborn child, it’s possible to achieve the outcome everyone wants — a healthy mother and a healthy baby.
This article first appeared at Endeavour Forum and is republished here by permission.