Suddenly and without any early signs, she found out
she had breast cancer. She did not cry nor did she
get depressed. On the contrary, her soul filled with
hope and grace, thanking God because what she had
was not worse than what other people have went
through, and because it is not a chronic disease
that will chase her for the rest of her life. It is
the Syrian artist Reem Al Taki, who has visited
Algeria to contribute to the miniature and
illumination festival that was launched in Talmasan
city. Jawaher Al Shurooq had a chance to meet Reem,
the ideal mother, the good wife and the shining
artist when it comes to miniatures, and so was this
conversation that came at no better time -the pink
breast cancer awareness month.
- How
did you come to specialize in miniatures?
I was in love with painting nature, I used to paint
Damascene houses and nature, but I did not follow
this passion academically, in fact I studied French
literature and I stayed home after that in order to
raise my 3 children in Jordan for 20 years. But one
day, and after nostalgic longing to painting, my
little brush shined again to start painting a view
of Jerusalem with some illumination, I recall
watching on TV someone saying that women should take
care of their skills and sharpen them, so I decided
to grow my talent in miniatures, and that is when I
found out I had breast cancer.
- You
said you engaged in this art for a specific kind of
miniatures that involves flowers and birds?
Yes, I had paintings that pulled me towards this
theme, and it is known to be a standalone section of
miniatures. My private teacher informed me that this
part of miniatures needed almost a year to learn the
basics, and so far I still feel the need to learn a
lot more.
- How
did you find out you had breast cancer?
I
had no symptoms that could tell I had breast cancer,
I was visiting my sister in USA, and while I was
there she suggested that I go through a few tests
and x-rays because my mom, my aunt and her three
daughters had breast cancers, and I recalled my
sister assuring my mom about her breast cancer after
she went through chemotherapy and successfully won
over cancer.
After going back to Jordan, the only thing my sister
told me was that I had to re-do some tests in Amman
because the x rays were not clear enough, I did the
tests and the results were negative. Two years after
that, my daughter was a senior student in medicine
and after she randomly took a look at my reports,
she found out that I had calcifications that were
prone to mutate into cancer, she insisted that I
re-do the tests and I did, the results came back
negative again. Then we went to another cancer
treatment center (Al Hussein) and I repeated the
same tests with biopsy, and that is when the results
came back positive.
-How
did you receive the bad news?
At
the time, my mother had come back from USA and I
went with her to Syria where I stayed for 5 days,
waiting in patience for my results. Finally in a
phone call with my doctor she told me to keep the
matter until I come back, but when I insisted, she
told me I had cancer. I did not fear for myself, I
actually had fear for my daughter for when she hears
the news.
- How did
your family react after finding out about the
cancer?
I
called my husband to inform him of the result, and
my daughter was listening in on the line and she
started crying. I came back to Jordan the following
day to start receiving therapy, I recall hearing
doctors saying that I had significant family history
in terms of cancer, mentioning that all my family
members who had cancer went through chemotherapy and
successfully healed except a cousin of mine who got
depressed and refused treatment, and later died.
-Can you
tell us more about what you went through while doing
chemotherapy?
Chemotherapy has numerous side effects that vary in
terms of severity depending on the person, like
vomiting, allergies, chronic exhaustion, shortness
of breath, dry mouth, increased body temperature,
mouth sores that result from lack of immunity,
feeling bad in general, and hair loss, in addition
to weight loss. I lost 9 Kilograms while doing
therapy, but I regained them back after I healed.
-How were
you able to live with the disease?
Since I love to draw, and I had a lot of time due to
inability to do house work, I decided to spend my
time painting. In this period I had passed my 3
months of chemotherapy, and I began radiotherapy,
which despite being a lot easier than chemotherapy,
still caused lack of sleep. I spent day and night
painting. And I hired a private Persian art teacher
to teach me miniatures at home, which helped me get
past the disease, I had high spirits and felt in a
way like no other.
- What do
you advise other women who have breast cancer, or
any other type of cancer?
I
advise any woman who has cancer to know and receive
this will of God well, and know that the result of
what we go through today will reaped tomorrow. God
does not test us unless he has hidden something
beautiful that embellishes our selves, and satisfies
our eyes. Sometimes when we hear meaningless
conversations like "if that person was good, then
why did they get this disease?" we should avoid
focusing on them or we will surely despair. God does
not oppress his creatures, every test that we go
through has a wisdom that God knows behind it, and
my relationship with art is my example, if I hadn't
gone through cancer I would not have stayed up all
those nights doing my paintings, where also socially
my relationship with my husband has become stronger
as he felt the warning once that he was going to
lose me, so he came to encourage me to paint more
than ever.
Women with cancer should fill their time with things
they love to do, or hobbies they prefer. & it is
very important that they become convinced that
cancer is like many other diseases, in the term that
it mainly needs therapy & follow-through. After
that, the suffering ends and hair regrows and
everything goes back into place! I remember when my
hair used to fall because of chemotherapy, I was not
sad, instead I put a hat on my head that looked
cute. Everybody liked how I looked with the hat, and
some of my relatives even started wearing ones just
like it for me.
Sumayya Sa'aada
28th Oct 2014
