Agustina Iparraguirre was 23 years old when she became pregnant. She had been dating Ariel for three years, whom she had met at work. He was a gastronomic professor and she was an administrator.
At first, they became friends and were part of a larger group. However, over time they found each other in another way and in 2008 they became engaged. A year later they moved in together and the desire to start a family began to take more and more shape. The pregnancy, Agustina says, was the most beautiful news in the world for the couple.
While pregnant, Agustina had flu-like symptoms for a few weeks. Above all, a cough that wouldn’t go away, a lot of back pain and fatigue.
As at that time the first cases of Influenza A appeared in the country, they hospitalized her believing that that was her diagnosis.
“They took me to the clinic to check me out, they did tests on me and it was clear that I had fluid in my pericardium. It was complicated and they decided to leave me in Intensive Care for a few days. While I was hospitalized, they did a biopsy on one of the lymph nodes in my neck and they told me that I could have a lymphoproliferative disease, but that I had to wait for the results of the biopsy.”
After 15 days, Agustina received the results: Hodking lymphoma in stage IIB. “Hearing that he had lymphatic cancer It was devastating. I had recently lost my dad to lung cancer and I was four months pregnant. My world turned upside down. Was very hard to assimilate and prepare myself physically and mentally to go through it,” he confesses.
As a result of his situation, the doctors decided that he should undergo chemotherapy treatment, but at lower doses. to affect the pregnancy as little as possible and reach term. Additionally, they gave her corticosteroids to strengthen Alma’s lungs and she remained that way until she was able to give birth.
“They told us there could be consequences. It was a pregnancy full of emotions and many times fear. Because every application of chemo she gave me, she stopped kicking. Sometimes a few hours, sometimes it was days. “It was distressing.”
At week 32, her baby’s growth stopped and she inevitably had to have a cesarean section. “Luckily, she was born stronger than all of us combined. She was tiny, 1,250 kilograms and 35 centimeters, small, but with the strength of a hurricane. She was born healthy, with her eyes wide open, she breathed on her own. A genius.”
Alma was born on July 2, 2010 and Agustina says that it was the most beautiful moment of her life, despite everything she was experiencing. She “She was born with so much force, screaming so much that she filled that operating room with light. She illuminated everything. Impossible to describe it. Every little thing that became huge. When I saw her for the first time I felt that everything made sense. That it was worth fighting and that he couldn’t give up. “She taught me the power of true love and how strong one can be.”
During the first chemo, Agustina says she clung to her unborn daughter. She couldn’t give up and dreamed of the opportunity to meet her, to look into her eyes, to hear her cry.
But when Alma was born and had to continue with the treatment, already with high doses, it was more difficult for her to face that part of the process that she still needed to go through in order to be cured. “I think I held on to life as best I could. I didn’t want it She grew up without her mother and I didn’t want to miss seeing her grow.”.
Agustina performed four chemotherapy protocols and to finish several radiotherapy sessions. At that moment they told him that the disease had disappeared and that an autologous bone marrow transplant was necessary to seal the treatment. In April 2012 she was discharged permanently.
I try to be my best version every day. I think it was only a few years ago, when some wounds began to heal, that I was able to start enjoying it more. At first, it was difficult for me because the first two years of her life I was practically a stranger, I lived in hospitals and the quality time we spent together was very little. She felt it and she also had a hard time bonding with me when everything had already happened. Little by little we got used to having each other close, to being mother and daughter and enjoying each other.
Today we are the closest friends, we have the same character, so we also have our clashes, but we talk about everything, we accompany each other.
We both play volleyball and we are fans of each other. We are united by the same passion for music, she plays the piano, I play the guitar and we both sing. We are building a beautiful bond.
A while ago Agustina began to capture images on her computer. 23 years old, a book in which he tells in the first person everything he experienced during all those years that he carried on his back. She had to channel all the accumulated anger and fear, as well as the wonderful experience of being Alma’s mother. What was the writing process like?
It took me several years to finish it. I was writing every time I felt the need to do so and many times I had to stop because the memory was so strong that it was felt even on the skin.
Writing involved starting to unravel, let go and cry everything that I hadn’t cried for more than 10 years. I allowed myself to be a person and feel what I needed to feel. Writing was the beginning of my true recovery.
What do you feel when you look at history 14 years ago?
Sometimes I don’t fall for everything I’ve had to live through. Some things really look like something out of a movie. But I think what continues to amaze me even today is the ability we have to draw strength from where there is none, how strong we can become and how much we have to learn.
What did all that experience teach you?
This story brought me a lot of pain and was the hardest thing I had to live through, but it forced me to transform. It taught me about self-love, it made me ask myself questions that, perhaps, I would never have asked myself. It forced me to work until I was tired with my emotions, to learn to recognize them, to manage them. It taught me to see life in a different way, to value it and enjoy it above all things. We are moments.
What would you say to those who are going through an oncological disease?
May they never give up, even when everything seems to go out. That, even in the most intense darkness, there is always a ray of light. That they are not alone, that they allow themselves to be in every way. Being strong is also being human. That giving way to the emotions that go through us is a way to free ourselves and be lighter to face whatever we have to face. And that one does not know what it is to be strong until being strong is the only possible option. You have to believe that there is always a new dawn.