Patricia Borromeo: Portrait of faith and courage

In the charmed circle where she cuts a graceful figure, it was rumored early last that she was dying of cancer. But Patricia Borromeo put all rumors to rest when she took a bow at the finale of Rhett Eala’s bridal fashion show. She was a radiant bride as she marched down the ramp, all dressed in immaculate white veil and white gown, and sporting a cropped hairdo, a la Mia Farrow. She bore not a single scar of her bruising battle with the grim reaper. Rhett, a very good friend of Patricia, cried unabashedly like a baby as Patricia gave him a big hug. Everybody cried, there was not a dry eye around. And then there was a thunder of applause. Clearly, it was a double victory celebration: Rhett’s and Patricia’s.

"I feel good, I’m on remission," Trisha tells us with a smile as bright as sunshine on a hot summer day. "I had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the same disease that Jackie Kennedy Onassis died of. But at first, it was misdiagnosed as thymoma (cancer of the thymus gland that’s vital to the development of the body’s immune system)."

It started as a little chest pain that felt like a heartburn, but it didn’t bother Trisha because she thought it would go away. It didn’t. "I’d have a hard time sleeping because I’d be coughing," she relates, "but I ignored it because I could bear the pain, it wasn’t excruciating."

Trisha was graduating from Ateneo University with a Master’s Degree in Education and was in the thick of doing her thesis. A visit to the doctor just wasn’t on her list of her priorities. "But when the pain became bothersome already, I went to a doctor who’s like a family friend. He gave me cough medicine to suppress my cough and another medicine for the pain. Then he said, ‘Since you’re here already, you might as well have a chest x-ray.’ Everything happened so fast. When I was down at the x-ray room, all the friends of my father (the late Ramon Borromeo was an orthopedic surgeon at Makati Medical Center) were there and they asked why I was there. They had my x-ray rushed. Then they didn’t allow me to go anymore, they said they had to do a CT scan. From the CT scan, the doctor broke the news to me that they suspected it was lymphoma."

It was like being given a death sentence and anyone in Patricia’s shoes would have broken down. But it wasn’t so for Patricia who’s made of sterner stuff. "I took it well," she asserts. "I didn’t ask why me. It was harder for my mom (former Miss Philippines Myrna Panlilio-Borromeo). I had other concerns, like I asked the doctor what the next step was. I told him to be honest with me, not to sugarcoat anything because I was big enough to know the truth."

Next thing she knew she was kneeling down in the hospital chapel side by side her mom. They prayed. Her mom cried and cried, she didn’t know how to console her.

"The next step was biopsy – fine needle aspiration (drawing out fluid or tissue from the body)," Trisha proceeds to give a step-by-step account of her treatment. "After that, I started feeling pain, it was like they stuck something there and it grew bigger. I had a hard time sleeping and breathing. Their findings were that it was thymoma or cancer of the thymus gland – after age 11, you don’t need this anymore so it sort of disintegrates, but mine did not. The word thymoma wasn’t new to me because an aunt had it almost five years ago. But she’s related to me only by marriage – she’s the wife of my dad’s brother. I did my research and talked to doctors. They sent my biopsy to three pathologists and the finding was thymoma. If you have thymoma, the procedure is surgery and radiation. The day I checked in for surgery, my oncologist came in and told me they were not doing surgery because they studied my case, had a conference and found out that the mass was located in a delicate part – it was latched on to my heart and it was as big as my fist. So my doctor said they were going to shrink it by chemotherapy."

Trisha braced herself for eight cycles of chemo treatment. Makati Med doctors sent her slides to New York and Yale. After two chemos for thymoma, they found out from the States that Trisha had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. "So they had to change the combination of my medication," says Trisha. "I was lucky because I took to the drugs really well, it was unlike what you see in the movies of cancer patients throwing up and stuff like that. My first two chemos were harder. My white blood cell count would go down, which made me prone to getting an infection, so they had to give me shots to bring it up. For five days, I’d feel discomfort, like I was coming down with a flu and my body ached all over. I’d lose my appetite, I wouldn’t feel so up and about so I’d stay home for five days but after that, I was OK."

Between treatments, Trisha went about her usually hectic routine – or should we say doing things she loves doing. Like going to the gym, doing her fitness regimen like boxing and Pilates, walking around the neighborhood and walking Maggie, the family’s Golden Retriever. "Or I’d go out, have dinner, watch a movie," she describes her nightlife. "But I avoided going to smoky places. I even went on a trip to Bangkok. And I went to Boracay, 20 of us friends, after my radiation to celebrate."

As usual, she either starts or ends her day by attending Mass, wherever she finds herself.

When she was told she was going to do chemo, a hairdresser friend came to the Borromeo house and snipped 10 inches off her long locks. "I had my hair cut really short so it would be less of a trauma when it started to fall," she explains. "Fifteen days after my first chemo, my hair started to fall in clumps. It came to a point when I didn’t want to comb or shampoo my hair anymore. I’d just be sitting down and I was shedding. When you’re having chemo, what happens is that your scalp becomes really sensitive."

She adds, "My doctor encouraged me to ask anything I wanted to, even the most stupid questions like, ‘Am I going to lose my eyebrows or eyelashes?’ I did, I lost every hair in my body and became like a newborn baby. But they say that after a chemo, you exude a certain glow."

It was a chic excuse for Trisha to wear a wig, a bandana or a hat whenever she went out. Now, her hair is slowly growing back and she’s enjoying her short, wash-and-wear hair especially with the days becoming hotter.

Not that Trisha didn’t have a choice. "I was very lucky to have a doctor (oncologist Dr. Gary Lorenzo, whose father was a colleague of Trisha’s father) who respected me. He said, ‘You’re the boss, whatever you want to do, it’s your body.’"

"If it weren’t for my family, I would have gone all-alternative, I didn’t want to do chemo," she points out. "I was already consulting with my homeopathic doctor who was telling me that he’d rather that I go all-alternative. I met him through my friend Mavis Manotoc’s mom Aurora Pijuan who’s into magnets. Also, before I got sick, I heard about actress Suzanne Somers who has breast cancer and saw her on Larry King Live. She didn’t want to do chemo; she opted to go all-natural – she would get mistletoe shots from the plant’s extract. Even way back then, I was already into holistic medicine. When I’d have a cough, I don’t pop pills – for me, it’s like your body talking to you, so let it out. If I’d have a fever, my mom would warn me not to take a bath but I’d take a bath."

So which way did she go?

"It was a struggle so I prayed about it," says Trisha. "The day before I started my chemo, I prayed to St. Therese of the Child Jesus, who’s really close to my heart. With a cousin and two friends, I went to Baclaran where St. Therese has a statue outside. I asked her for a sign – a white flower if I should go all-alternative and a yellow flower if all-western. One day, I came home and saw a bouquet sent by a friend. I looked at the flowers, one was white and one was yellow. I said no, this is not it, I’m going to wait for another sign. But I just found it so strange that it was a fruit basket but there were flowers at the same time. There were other colors but the white and yellow were beside each other. But I said no, wala pa ’to. The next day, I got another arrangement – it was the same thing: all the other colors on one side while the white and the yellow were beside each other again."

If that was strange, read this. "I haven’t told you that when we were going home from Baclaran, all of a sudden, we were talking about the statue of St. Therese," Trisha recounts. "She was so pretty and her eyes were smiling. My cousin said, ‘Yeah, she has sparkling eyes.’ My two friends wondered what we were talking about because they didn’t see anything. My cousin and I saw it – she was smiling at both of us. We said no way, no way. We went back and it wasn’t the same face that we saw. I don’t know if you’d believe it but for me, a miracle had happened already."

Trisha combined natural and western medicine. "It worked very well, they complemented each other," she affirms. "Maybe it’s also why I didn’t have bad side effects after my chemo."

Ever the health buff in the family (which was why her mom was shocked when she got sick), Trisha continues to stick to her "absolutely no red meat and no white sugar" diet. She describes what’s on her diet: "I like leafy vegetables like watercress, spinach, Baguio beans, sayote tops. I eat them boiled, sauteed or raw with some dressing. I also take night shade vegetables (those that grow at night) like tomato and potato. I buy all my veggies from the organic market or order them from a lady and have them picked up at Victory Liner in Pasay. For breakfast, I take oatmeal or fruits and milk (Rice Dream from Healthy Options) or wholewheat pancakes. For lunch and dinner, I eat brown rice with fish or chicken."

Trisha supplements her diet with OMX probiotic functional food (a naturally fermented mixture of wild fruits, herbs and organic vegetables grown in a clean environment in the northern part of China and Japan).

Throughout her treatment, she could eat any-thing – in moderation, of course. If she craved Japanese food (except sashimi or raw food), paella from El Cirkulo or something from Cibo, her mom would get it for her. "That’s the perk of getting sick," she laughs.

Trisha is quick to stress, "You do have options – whether alternative or western, whatever works for you. Cancer is not a death sentence. You just have to have a positive outlook. I think it’s 99 percent mind and one percent everything else."

She gushes, "I also felt really loved. Gosh, God sent me all these special people to take care of me. I never felt alone. My family and friends were there with me through it all."

During a chemo treatment, Trisha’s hospital room would be brimming with guests you’d think somebody was throwing a party.

"Before I had my chemo, they had a Mass for me and they composed their own prayers," says a grateful Trisha.

"She was the most prayed-for sick girl," says prayerful and devoted mom Myrna Borromeo. "I would be approached by people in the supermarket and they’d tell me, ‘Mrs. Borromeo, we’re praying for your daughter.’ Her former students would also send her cards. Imagine all these little kids writing her."

Trisha’s friends turned out in full force when she celebrated her 30th birthday last Aug. 25.

A proud mom relates, "I remember when she was in college at Assumption, she was so scared to cross the street and I was in a hurry so she was left behind. I felt guilty and looked back. But look at her now, she’s so brave. I draw my strength from her. When I’d tell people she has lymphoma, she’d correct me and say, ‘Mommy, I had lymphoma.’ Both my daughters Trisha and Mitzi are very strong."

And at times playful. While she was sick, Trisha told her mom, "I think I’m the favorite of Dad so he’s going to take me."

Says a teary-eyed Myrna: "I went upstairs and told my husband, "Don’t you dare, you’re not going to take my daughter away. I think God prepared me for Trisha’s illness. I was visiting a friend who had cancer and then I heard Mass. At the sermon, the priest said that God doesn’t always grant what we pray for but we have to trust Him because He knows what’s best for us. You just tell Him, ‘Thy will be done.’ I said I wish I could do that. The next day, I found out about Trisha’s illness."

It also helped a lot that Trisha had a support group. Among them were Kara Magsanoc-Alikpala who had a lumpectomy and Noelle Hechanova who had exactly the same disease as Trisha’s. "We went through it together, we helped each other out," says Trisha. "She was graduating from college then and I was graduating from my masters."

Actress Rio Diaz, herself a cancer patient, sent Trisha a book and a bandana. Says Trisha, "According to my doctor, she’d visit his clinic and ask for the list of all his cancer patients. She’d talk to them and send them each a book."

Today, Trisha is in the pink of health. "The chemo has shrunk the mass," she says. "It’s been almost a year – I was diagnosed March 29. Now, I just have to go to the doctor every three months. For the first two years, I have to go for CT scan every three months. After two years, twice a year and after five years, once a year."

She’s full of life and dreams. You must have heard about her TEA (The Early Academy) House in Makati. "It’s a dream come true for me," she enthuses. "Even as a little girl, I’ve always wanted to be a teacher. You’d read in my high school yearbook that I wanted to have my own school. TEA is a very small playschool for kids aged one year and five months old. They come only twice or thrice a week mainly for socialization. Last year, we put up a nursery school for three- to four-year-olds. Early education is very important for kids during their formative years. It’s better than for them to just sit in front of the TV and watch programs that parents have no control over."

Trisha wants to go back to doing volunteer work for children with cancer. "I was a foster parent to a cancer child at the Enchanted Kingdom two years ago," she shares.

Trisha loves children. And eventually, marriage and having kids of her own (maybe just two – a boy and a girl – because it’s expensive to raise a big family) will come.

"I’m just living my life one day at a time," she says. "There’s no day for me but today. Getting sick was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I learned a lot, it made me a better person. I took stock of my life – other people don’t get to do that. You kinda stop and think, ‘Why is God giving me a second lease on life?’"

We can think of a thousand and one beautiful reasons.