SEOUL: While breastfeeding her son in January, Connie Sun discovered a lump in her breast. The new mother figured it was a “breastfeeding lump, which would disappear”.
She knew that juggling being a new mother and cancer while separated from her family in Singapore was going to be hard. Initially, she also had problems seeking treatment, as many of the hospitals in South Korea were designated for COVID-19 patients. She resorted to making video calls to a number of different hospitals before she secured an appointment with a doctor.“There was also the fear that every time we visited a hospital, there was always the chance that a coronavirus patient had been there,” she said.
“Sometimes when he’s crying, and my husband’s in the bathroom, there’s nothing I can do. I can’t carry him, I can’t change his diaper, I can’t do much to pacify him,” she said.During her chemotherapy sessions, which take place over four-day stretches, her husband must stay with her in hospital. And her friends cannot visit.
If she were treated in Singapore, where she has an insurance plan, it would have covered most of her hospital and chemotherapy bills, she noted. She was, however, initially hesitant about accepting financial help. She felt that she should be helping others instead. “The help we’ve received is tremendous,” she said. “They knew that we had no family members in Korea who could help us. So they tried their best to do what a family would do for me in the situation.”