TODAY MY LIFE CAME FULL CIRCLE AS I MET THE EXTRAORDINARY
DR. CHRISTINE CSERTI
But let me start from the beginning.
12 years ago, on the day before my first chemotherapy treatment for non-Hodgkin lymphoma, I was at Dr. Rodger Tiedemann’s office at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre for bloodwork and get clearance to start treatment. I remember feeling tired at the clinic and started telling Dr. Tiedemann about a karaoke party I had at my home the night before with colleagues at work. The normally calm Dr. Tiedemann looked at my blood results and his face went pale. My hemoglobin had plummeted to 42 from 90 a couple of weeks before (the normal value for hemoglobin for a woman is 120 – 160). He was quite surprised that I was standing calmly in front of him; he appeared flustered and kept asking me how I was feeling. He immediately arranged for an ambulance to take me to the Toronto General Hospital (TGH) across the street, as The Princess Margaret does not have an emergency department.
As soon as I got to the emergency unit, I knew my case was serious as it was all hands on-deck. I was in a curtained-off room with Nagib, Shayne and Sabrina. While waiting to figure out what would happen next, we overheard a phone conversation between the emergency room doctor and someone at the other end of the line, talking about the patient in Bed 9, beside me. It appeared that this woman was not going to live and needed a blood transfusion immediately or all her organs would shut down. And then the doctor corrected himself and said, “Oh sorry, not Bed 9, it’s Bed 8.” I was in Bed 8 and the thought hit me that I was going to die that night at TGH. It was the first time that the thought of death had even crossed my mind. When my hemoglobin dropped to a dangerously low 36, I was pumped with even more steroids and moved to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).
The doctors explained to us that, due to the number of blood transfusions I had received, my body had created antibodies that were destroying my red blood cells, a condition known as acute hyper hemolytic anemia. I needed multiple blood transfusions that were cross-matched for very specific antibodies. The blood bank reported that the process had already started but would take up to six hours. I recall overhearing the emergency doctor yelling into the phone, “We don’t have six hours! We need that blood now or the patient will die!”. The person at the other end of the line was arguing that giving me additional blood transfusions without properly checking for antibodies would be just as fatal. That person was Dr. Christine Cserti.
As I write about it in my book, “Choosing Hope: 1 Woman, 3 Cancers”, that was the darkest night of our lives as we prepared for the real possibility of my death. Nagib, Shayne and Sabrina were huddled around my bed.
Miracle of miracles, two days later, after receiving four units of blood overnight, I walked out of the Intensive Care Unit. Sabrina writes in the book,
While our faith was being tested, a team of hematologists led by Dr. Christine Cserti was working hard in the blood bank to find the perfect blood match. It’s almost like while we were questioning God’s plans, God was busy in the blood bank saying, “Guys, it’s okay, I got this”.
We owe our gratitude to Dr. Cserti and her team for working nonstop until they found the right blood from four different blood donors to combat the Y and C antibodies I had developed.
The next day, Dr. Cserti came to visit me at the hospital and explained to me that my body had been the site of a battle between antibodies and blood cells, and that it was miraculous that I had survived the night.
And today, 12 years later, a mutual friend arranged a meeting with the Dr. Christine Cserti. She was the transfusions medicine specialist at the hospital the day I was brought in. She and her team worked hard to find the blood I needed in record time. She is one of the main reasons I am still alive today. I was nervous, excited, beside myself. Would I recognize her? What would I say to her? And then she showed up and I almost broke down. We hugged and we cried. And then we hugged and cried some more.
I was so touched that she had my book, and it was dog-eared and had notes all over it. She knew every chapter and recalled every story in it. She apologized for my mischievous veins. She delighted in the story about Nagib being called Casanova in Florida. She was sad about my fall near Jamatkhana. She marveled at the magic of Mozobil to wake up my stem cells. She loved the different perspectives in the book that Shayne, Sabrina and Nagib offered because it painted the reality that you don’t do cancer alone. She read to me aloud one of her favourite passages in the book,
I believe that we are in partnership with God. We cannot sit back and let Him do all the work. We have to do our part and trust that He knows what is best. It’s only human to worry. But it’s also liberating to know that God is the architect, the master planner, the director, and the producer.
This is quite a perspective coming from a scientist.
Being with Christine today for a few hours literally brought me full circle on my cancer journey. I listened to my story from her perspective as she described it: coming to terms with a harrowing experience and finding a way through it; a story of miracles and gratitude; of hope, love and faith. And as I reflect on what she said, I am sitting in quiet reflection as I process the past 12 years and how blessed I am to be alive, against all odds.
Christine is a brilliant, thoughtful and kind scientist, who is passionate about her work as a transfusion medicine specialist. She is also a clinical hematologist for outpatient clinics, inpatient consults and apheresis (a process used for stem cell transplants). I knew that I would be very emotional seeing Christine today; what I was surprised about was how meaningful it was for Christine to see me. In her work, she does not often see patients after the initial diagnosis and treatment. So, seeing me today after 12 years was meaningful for her, and it helped bring things full circle for both of us.
God works in mysterious ways and, on this day, I have no doubt that He was instrumental in working through Christine to ensure that everything would work out according to His plan. For this, I am incredibly grateful.
