Finding faith in the face of serious illness

From sudden paralysis to an aggressive breast cancer, overcoming a life-threatening diagnosis is never a given. Yet for two women who confronted their mortality, the road to recovery was marked by resilience and a deepening faith that saw them through their darkest moments. 

For Johannesburg mother Leanne Phillips a week that started with severe earache, followed by consultations with three bemused doctors, culminated in a feeling of pins and needles throughout her body. At this point, her husband called Hatzolah. Immediately hospitalised, Phillips underwent numerous tests and woke up a paraplegic. Battling to breathe, she was ultimately given a tracheotomy. 

After more tests, including an MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging scan) and lumbar puncture, she was diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS). GBS is a rare and serious neurological disorder in which the immune system mistakenly attacks the peripheral nerves, which carry signals from the brain and spinal cord to the rest of the body. It usually occurs suddenly and has various degrees of severity. 

“In many cases that aren’t as serious, you can become paralysed from your waist down, but I was paralysed from my neck down,” Phillips explains, recalling her 2024 ordeal. 

While she believes in G-d and has always instilled Jewish values in her home, Phillips says she’s not religious at all. “But the emunah (faith) I had to get through this process made me believe even more,” she says, fighting back tears. 

“I was in a semi coma most of the time, but when I was awake, I would just keep saying the Shema over and over,” she recalls. “This was the one prayer in my head, and I knew that if I was getting it right, my mind was still functioning.” 

She had numerous operations during her time in hospital and doctors told her family that she’d remain there for a minimum of six months. Yet after being treated with a blood plasma exchange – which cleans the blood by removing and replacing the plasma to get rid of harmful substances – Phillips began regaining feeling. 

It was on her birthday, just weeks after her admission, that everything changed. 

“My dad died on my birthday when I was a child and so, as an adult, I never celebrated because it was always a hard day for me,” she says. “But on my birthday in the hospital, I spoke and breathed for the first time on my own, and I took my first few steps. In my head, it was like my dad saying, ‘It’s okay, you can celebrate again.’” 

Phillips proved the doctors wrong and made a full recovery within eight weeks. “Especially because my dad died when I was so young, I wasn’t going to let my children grow up without a mother,” she says. 

“I survived what was meant to break me. My emunah gave me the strength to keep going and to believe that even when I couldn’t see the full picture, Hashem could. He gave me this strength when I thought I had nothing left. Through my belief, I learned to trust that everything has a purpose and a bigger plan.” 

For Durban-based entrepreneur and mother Joeleen Hermelin, surviving breast cancer also came down to faith. 

Despite her mother having faced the disease, Hermelin was shocked when she was diagnosed with a fast-moving, hormonal, and aggressive breast cancer in November 2022. “I was one of the healthiest and most active people I knew,” she says. 

Beginning chemotherapy within three weeks of her diagnosis, Hermelin was strong throughout. She took Ubers to gym when she felt up to it and chose to see shaving her hair off as a spiritual and mental reboot. In addition to her exercise regime, she overhauled her diet, stress management, and problem-solving approach. 

“I took my diagnosis very seriously and made drastic changes very quickly,” she says. “It wasn’t an option for me to get to the finish line before the cancer did.” She was determined to live a life with her two young daughters. 

But after she completed chemotherapy, during a routine, presurgical MRI before her scheduled lumpectomy, doctors discovered another area of concern that needed to be tested. If it was found to be sinister too, she would probably need a mastectomy. In the face of this possibility, Hermelin shut down, believing she wouldn’t recover from that. 

“While I’ve always been an observant Jew, I didn’t pray a lot,” she says. “So, after that news, I walked on the beach, and I prayed there every morning.” The second lesion was ultimately benign, and her lumpectomy was successful. She also underwent radiation. 

Today, three years later, Hermelin is cancer-free and, having chosen not to undergo hormone therapy, keeps her oestrogen levels down naturally. 

Yet, maintaining her healthy lifestyle isn’t effortless. 

“About a year ago, I was really struggling to reconnect with my fitness in a proper way,” she recalls. That’s when she heard about the Masada Run and Walkathon. The event raises funds for Masada, a Jewish organisation in Durban offering a sheltered employment workshop to provide work opportunities and skills development for adults with intellectual disabilities and psychiatric illnesses. 

Hermelin decided to enter the 10km run to regain her fitness. On impulse, she asked a shul acquaintance, who was on a wellness journey, to run with her. And so, a special friendship and running partnership was born. “From that run onwards, we started running every Sunday together, and we’ve barely missed a Sunday since,” says Hermelin. The two have also completed numerous marathons together. 

“Because of the Masada Run, I have this beautiful friendship, I got my fitness back, and my engine got started,” she says. “When I was diagnosed, the Durban Jewish community also rallied around me. So, this year, I wanted to do something to give back.” Hermelin is therefore using the Masada Run and Walkathon on 26 July to raise funds for the organisation, with her target now increased to R118 000. While she was initially reluctant to discuss her cancer journey publicly, she now feels that if her story helps even one person, it’s worth sharing.