By Emilie Ng
WHEN Margaret Keast was given three to six months to live, she didn’t bat an eyelid.
The 68-year-old had already endured a 15-year battle with breast cancer, and news that it had worsened, turning into secondary cancer in her stomach and bones, had “no effect”.
The Beenleigh parishioner decided she “had no problem with death” because of her hope in God.
“I have a great faith, and I put that down to my parents,” Margaret said.
Born in 1946, Margaret was given up for adoption at an “unwed army girl’s home”.
A devout Catholic couple adopted her, a rare and merciful deed at the time when there was a social belief that “illegitimate children would carry the sins of their mother and father”.
Although “very blessed from the word go”, Margaret cut ties with her Catholic faith when she was seven and her mother died.
“I was angry at God, angry at Mary, because my mum died when I was so young,” she said.
Boarding school was used as a pseudo-replacement for her maternal lacking, but Margaret said she “wasn’t nurtured”.
“I suppose I was throwing off the constraints of boarding school but I didn’t practise my faith for a number of years,” she said.
Margaret lived in Melbourne and eventually married and had two children.
“I married at 27 but I wasn’t very mature at 27, but I had to be once my son was born,” she said.
“I felt that it was necessary for me to go back to Church to show him a good example because I was given a good example.”
Margaret joined the Beenleigh parish and immediately felt at home in the Charismatic Renewal.
“From there things just blossomed and my walk with God was just so amazing and remarkable,” she said.
It was when her spiritual life was strongest that other areas of her life began to collapse, including her health.
Margaret, then in her early 50s, received her first breast cancer diagnosis, along with a string of other bad news.
“I suppose when we get to about 15 years ago, my personal life wasn’t in a very good place,” she said.
“There were lots of things happening – my marriage had ended, we’d lost our home, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, and it was just one thing after another.”
Margaret dealt with her broken marriage, finding a new home and re-entering the workforce, but pushed her health aside.
“I didn’t have time to think about the breast cancer,” she said.
“I had to find a house for myself, my daughter, and my elderly relative who was living with us as well, I had to get a job …
“And these things at the time were far more important than the breast cancer.”
The cancerous lump was eventually removed, but Margaret refused chemotherapy, saying it “wasn’t for me”.
Everything was crumbling around her but Margaret “just got on with life”, going back to work, supporting her adult children and remaining active in the parish and Charismatic community.
After landing a summer job at the Gold Coast’s MovieWorld retail centre, she eventually found part-time work at Woolworths.
“During that time I met so many women with breast cancer,” she said.
“I didn’t realise how many women had breast cancer.”
Eighteen months before retiring, Margaret “felt really ill” and made another visit to the doctor.
“They found secondary cancer in my stomach and bones and the specialist said ‘the type of cancer you have in your stomach, you’ll be dead within three to six months’,” she said.
The news did little to shake Margaret.
“I had lived with it for so many years,” she said.
“To be honest, it didn’t affect me one way or another.
“I just knew I had to sort myself out and get stuff organised, so I did that.”
Three months went by, and she “didn’t feel any worse”.
After six months, Margaret needed a new wardrobe, having given most of her clothes away.
When 12 months passed, she was given palliative care, but cancelled it when her symptoms were not worsening.
“During all of this time, I’d been to many healing Masses, weekend retreats, laying of hands, you name it,” she said.
About five months ago, when Margaret had been living 18 months longer than expected, she sat with the specialist one last time.
“The specialist sat and looked at me and he said – and I’m thinking the worst you can possibly imagine – he goes, ‘Fifteen years with breast cancer and you’re still here’.
“But I said, ‘What about my stomach?’
“And the specialist said, ‘There’s nothing wrong with your stomach’.
“I said, ‘I beg your pardon?’
“‘There is nothing in your stomach that isn’t in mine. There’s no cancer in your stomach’.
“I said to my doctor, ‘God has healed me’.
“When I left the surgery, I felt as if my feet weren’t even touching the ground.
“But when I came down to earth, what I realised was, my life is no longer my own.
“I’ve been given this extra time, I’ve got to use it for the Lord.
“I’ve started visiting a lady who has cancer, and I dare say I’ll be visiting a lot more people.
“And I’ve shared my story to all the Masses in my parish to bring hope.”
Margaret’s general practitioner of a number of years, from Shailer Park Medical Centre, said this was only the second case of an “unexplained remission” in 34 years as a doctor.
“Her cells were looked at by pathologists and the gastroenterologist and she definitely had cancer spreading all over her body,” the doctor said.
“Later she was reviewed and it had all gone.
“There was no other reason for this because there was no chemotherapy, no medication.
“She’s outsmarted the doctors again.
“I can’t explain it – it really is quite miraculous.”
While Margaret knows miracles are rare, she believes what every cancer sufferer needs more desperately is hope.
“Just know there is hope,” Margaret said.
“Cancer is not a death sentence.
“When things looked worst in your life, that’s when He’s the closest.”
