Baby Mienke’s mom, Verna, diagnosed with cancer

Barely a year and a half after losing Mienke Mulder at the age of three, her mother, Verna, has been diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer.

Lowvelders first came to know the Mulder family when Mienke suffered severe brain damage after choking on her bottle while in the care of her day mother in 2017. She passed away on September 15, 2020 at the age of three years and seven months.

Verna said she did not really react or freak out upon receiving her diagnosis. “To tell you the honest truth, I actually expected it.”

She said you can kind of make your own assumptions based on the doctors’ and nurses’ behaviour.  She went for a sonar and mammogram on April 14, but only received the news on April 18.

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“I told myself, I hope it is something they can cut out and then it is over, but the doctor unfortunately said they have to do chemo first, then an operation, and then radiation therapy.”

One of her first questions to the oncologist was whether the chemo would cause hair loss. “I have told a lot of people, I think I am more traumatised by the fact that my hair might fall out than the fact that I have cancer. I really take pride in my hair. It is part of your identity.”

When telling her daughters about the news, they cried over the fact that Mommy might lose her hair. “They are just as crazy about their own hair, and Mommy’s hair,” Verna said with a laugh.

The road ahead is still somewhat uncertain for her, as she has never walked this journey with anyone close to her. She knows the chemotherapy will take at least six months and will likely start either this week or the next. She said they just plan on taking this day by day.

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“I do not know, I am really very calm about this whole thing, it is probably mercy from above. And what I have also been telling a lot of people, is that we have been through a lot more than this; I cannot imagine that there is anything worse than losing a child. That is something that changed my being, my way of life. The fact that I have breast cancer does not sound and feel as harsh as the day Mienke passed away.”

At this stage she worries about working the treatments and doctor visits into their daily lives.  The support Verna has received from family and friends helps with some of the worries, though, she said.

Her faith has carried her through a lot, and she is determined that it will again.

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“I will not lie and say I do not have questions. I think it is normal to ask the first thing, ‘Now, why this, too?’, I mean, we have already been through so much. I have joked with my friends saying that I can think of a few people who need some excitement in their lives; at this stage of the fight, I really do not need this, too. But we are not allowed to doubt the Lord or ask questions, I think you just have to trust and believe. A lot of people say I am a strong girl; maybe that is why the Lord gave it to me, I would not know.”

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