The two women have separate lives that they live. They couldn’t be any different. One is white. The other is Latina. Their commonalities, though, doesn’t discriminate across either ethnic or cultural lines. Cancer, faith and family have a way of doing that. All three of those factors have united Luz Elena and Jaime Jenkins in the fight against breast cancer.
The two women have separate lives that they live. They couldn’t be any different. One is white. The other is Latina. Their commonalities, though, doesn’t discriminate across either ethnic or cultural lines. Cancer, faith and family have a way of doing that. All three of those factors have united Luz Elena and Jaime Jenkins in the fight against breast cancer.
Both women have joined the campaign to raise awareness about the breast cancer and to give living testimony about what it means to be a survivor and to encourage others who are and have gone through the process of battling cancer. Elena and Jenkins both attended and participated in the Second Annual Knott’s Berry Farm for the Cure Partnership with Susan G. Komen Orange County announcement event on Saturday, Jan. 10 that took place at the theme park.
The event help usher in a “Pink Ticket” discount for guests attending Knott’s Berry Farm through March 27. Portion of the proceeds will go to benefit Susan G. Komen Orange County.
Elena, a Anaheim resident, was hit with the news from her doctor that she had Stage 3 breast cancer in 2012 after she went to see her doctor about the possibility of getting breast implants. At the time she found out she had breast cancer, Elena said she thought she was fine.
“I could feel nothing,” Elena said.
For Jenkins, the discovery of having Stage 4 cancer came within weeks after she had attended last year’s Knott’s Berry Farm for the Cure Partnership with Susan G. Komen Orange County function, was indeed a shock since she was just 39 at the time of her diagnosis.
Jenkins shared that testimony in front of a throng of attendees of the Second Annual Knott’s Berry Farm for the Cure Partnership with Susan G. Komen Orange County promotion kickoff.
“It was like a random thing,” Jenkins told the audience. “Chemotherapy is hard. Being sick is hard. Losing my hair was hard.”
Like other breast cancer survivors attending the event, Jenkins provided a front of encouragement as her smiled gleamed with enthusiasm and took part in the morning affair with boundless energy and a seemingly unbreakable strength fortified by the support of her family and from her faith in God.
“It was a lot of fear at first, mostly for my children,” Jenkins said. “I had to get rid of the fear. He’s [God] going to take care of them. I’ve met so many wonderful people that have inspired me..we all have a struggle.”
Jenkins says she’s managed to embrace this challenge as a calling for her to do something great in other people’s lives. It is that thought that gives Jenkins the belief to stay positive about being diagnosed with breast cancer and walk in the pathway of not being afraid of what she cannot control.
“I don’t want to live with a legacy of fear,” Jenkins said. “My faith in God’s plan for me…He’s given me this plan.”
Since she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2012, Elena has volunteered her time trying with Cafecitos, a support organization that provides outreach and free mammograms to the Latino community in and around Orange County.
“Latinas don’t believe they can get (breast cancer) it,” Elena said. “Mammograms save lives.
Elena’s cancer has been in remission. But at one point during her bout with the deadly disease, she lost all of her hair. And the one constant throughout has been keeping her faith in God and thinking about her three children, she said.
“I think about God,” Elena said. “My faith is the first. It’s number one.”
