“If God doesn’t heal me, will I still proclaim He is loving and faithful?”: Doctor who was diagnosed with an aggressive blood cancer at 28

In 2023, Joycelyn Chong’s world was close to perfect.

At 28, the Malaysian medical doctor was living her best life in Australia – feeling fulfilled at work, happily married and loving God.

But when she flew back to Malaysia for her sister’s wedding, she discovered red spots on her legs. Her lymph nodes were also enlarged.

Alarm bells rang in her mind. As a doctor, she know these were unusual signs that could not be ignored. So, after her sister’s wedding, she went for a blood test.

The results shook her to the core.

“Your blood results show that you have leukaemia,” the doctor said gravely.

Joycelyn’s first question was: “How bad?”

“It’s not good,” the doctor replied. “You need to be admitted immediately.”

As her brother-in-law calmly sped down the highway towards one of Kuala Lumpur’s largest medical centres, Joycelyn and her husband, Weetyr, sat together in that terrifying space between the known and unknown.

That day, further tests confirmed the initial diagnosis: Joycelyn had an aggressive blood cancer, Precursor B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (Pre-B-cell ALL).

On the edge of the unknown

The initial days following the diagnosis were frenetic as Joycelyn, Weetyr and family members consulted doctors in Malaysia and Australia. Her cancer was aggressive and required treatment immediately.

After determining she might not survive a flight to Adelaide, Joycelyn was admitted to a tertiary hospital in Kuala Lumpur. It would be “home” for the next 35 days.

Weetyr was especially anxious; his father had succumbed to leukaemia. He could not bear the thought of going through it again.

“Initially, I was just lost. It was Joycelyn’s brother-in-law, an oncologist, who gathered the family and said, ‘Let’s pray.’ He was a big help, logically calming us down whilst pointing us to Jesus,” he said gratefully.

After Joycelyn’s cancer diagnosis, Weetyr and Joycelyn struggled in their own ways.

Meanwhile, Joycelyn was fighting a battle of her own.

“I didn’t question God in anger, but sorrow filled my prayers. My plea was, ‘Comfort my family. Steady my heart. Let this be my even-if season, not a what-if one’,” recalled Joycelyn, now 30.

Joycelyn clung to Philippians 4:6-7, training her mind and heart to keep anxiety at bay by bringing her requests before God with thanksgiving.

Questions of death and healing flooded her thoughts. “If God doesn’t heal me the way I am praying for,” she thought, “Will I still proclaim that He works all things for good, that He is loving and faithful?”

Those early days in the hospital taught her what it truly meant to surrender to God.

From doctor to patient

After finishing treatment in Malaysia, Joycelyn travelled back to Australia for three months of consolidation chemotherapy in preparation for an allogenic stem cell transplant. Miraculously, her youngest brother turned out to be a perfect donor match.

Harvesting the stem cells of Joycelyn’s youngest brother, Jared (right), on the day of transplantation.

In Adelaide, the Haematology team she had been working alongside was now treating her.

The days leading up to the transplant were “physically gruelling, but spiritually refining” as Joycelyn prepared her mind, body and heart for the procedure.

She faced severe fatigue, nausea and vomiting, which led to a loss of appetite. In those few months, Joycelyn lost 8kg.

Getting her hair shaved in hospital during her transplant admission.

Furthermore, she had to go through intensive oral, intravenous and spinal chemotherapy in the six months leading up to her transplant. Some periods required hospital admission for closer monitoring of side effects.

“Once again, the doctor had become the patient. But I knew none of this was a coincidence. Jehovah Jireh had gone before and ahead of me,” she said.

Joycelyn on the day of her transplant, with a quilt made by hospital volunteers for cancer patients.

From finance to support and healthcare, God provided. Her transplant in December 2023 was successful, to the relief of the young couple.

“2024 was a year of recovery for me, learning to live in community again after being isolated for so long, regaining strength and rediscovering my identity in Christ,” Joycelyn said.

“My hair eventually grew back, and my roots in God’s Word grew deeper as I yearned to know Him and just sit in His presence.”

Finding God in the darkest valley

At the six-month mark, her medical team was happy. Everything was in the clear.

Then December came, along with the worst migraines Joycelyn had ever experienced.

“The migraines kept getting worse day by day, until we decided to go to the hospital. An urgent MRI and spinal tap revealed the worst: a silent relapse with no usual symptoms presenting,” she recounted.

Her worst fears had come true, and she was crushed by the news.

She grieved for a time, then steeled herself with God’s truths.

“I knew I could not have a defeatist mindset if I wanted to start treatment. I had to accept that if God heals or does not heal me, I would be okay with the outcome. I need to be able to say that He is still good,” she said.

Joycelyn’s sister, Jessamine, and her husband, Rufus, came to visit Joycelyn in Adelaide post-transplant.

Joycelyn and Weetyr chose to focus on the miracles they had experienced, such as the divine timing of the migraines. If they had gone to the hospital any later, doctors said, things might have been a lot worse.

Every detail surrounding Joycelyn’s treatment had also been taken care of, from her healthcare to income protection.

Through the most difficult days, she held on to the One who had formed her.

“I asked God ‘why’ more during the relapse, and until today, there has been no clear answer … but I don’t think it would be beneficial for us to know why either. We’d just have come up with more ‘why’s!” she said, as Weetyr nodded beside her.

Instead, the Lord assured them of His presence, that He is still with them and that He has a plan for their lives.

A testimony of His mercy and grace

Looking back, Joycelyn believes God was drawing her back to Him. She admitted she had been laser-focused on her career to a point that it had become her idol.

“In the past 2.5 years, God has been teaching me to slow down. We pray every night and take it one day, one step at a time. Psalm 91 became my war cry, Psalm 23, my comfort, and Philippians 4, my response,” she shared.

For Weetyr, the journey has been one of establishing deeper foundations in Christ.

“We often say we trust God, that we have faith, but it’s experiences like these that really push us to hold onto Jesus no matter what,” he said.

Joycelyn’s cancer trial and pushed both her and Weetyr to deepen their trust in God.

Joycelyn is now in her fourth cycle of immunotherapy and continues to believe that the Lord will heal her. But even if He does not, she knows He is still good, always faithful and never late.

She has been through almost 20 lumbar punctures, 16 bone marrow biopsies, 12 radiotherapy sessions, four PICC lines, three cycles of immunotherapy, one stem cell transplant, and countless hospital visits and admissions.

“Yet, I’m still standing – not as a victim of circumstance, but as a testimony of His grace. Every day, I choose to live victoriously, not fearfully. To see the good in the valley and to find rest in the waiting,” she said.

For Joycelyn, sickness and death hold no power, because Christ has already won.

As 1 Corinthians 15:55 declares: “O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?”

RELATED STORIES:

At 30, just 1 month before her wedding, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer

In Primary 6, this boy found out he had Stage 4 bone cancer. In his dying months, God sent a motley crew to bring him Home.

The post “If God doesn’t heal me, will I still proclaim He is loving and faithful?”: Doctor who was diagnosed with an aggressive blood cancer at 28 appeared first on Salt&Light.