This is the second in a series of articles on breast cancer survivors sponsored by Miller Family Care.
In 2016, Anitrus Robinson, nicknamed Tink, said life was good. For two years she had been eating right, walking daily, raising her two children, working – just being. However, she did not feel quite right. On a whim she decided to take a pregnancy test and discovered that indeed she was pregnant.
As Tink moved through the first trimester she still did not feel well; in fact, her health began declining. She was seeing her doctor every two weeks but continued to feel that something was wrong.
In September Tink was hospitalized and tests were run including a CAT scan. The results showed lesions on her liver, kidneys and spine. At this point her obstetrician performed a breast exam and discovered a lump.
Tink was sent to University of Mississippi Medical Center for further tests and an accurate diagnosis. She was admitted on a Thursday and when she reached her room she said she was overwhelmed by a team of doctors telling her she needed to make a decision about keeping her baby or having an abortion. Tink said, “I was told ‘if you try and have this baby both of you could die, or one of you could live and one of you die.’ I was stunned; this was the first thing they said before they even found it was cancer.” She continued, “My daddy is a pastor and we’re a praying family, God fearing family. We prayed about it and I told them I didn’t want to do it.”
On Friday the doctors found the reason for her declining health: her calcium levels were too high. Normal range is 7/8 while Tink’s was running 17/18.
She received an experimental treatment that had not been tested except on animals and could harm her unborn child; however, doctors said if she did not take it she would not see Monday. “We prayed and I took the treatment. It burned and burned. By Monday my calcium level was becoming normal – Praise God for that!”
Tink endured two biopsies as the first one used wrong tissue samples. Pathology results showed she had Stage 4 breast cancer. She was 20 weeks into her pregnancy at this point.
Now the doctors had to come up with a plan of treatment to safeguard her baby as well as kill the cancer. Tink underwent doxorubicin chemotherapy, commonly called the red devil. “No, no, no! We’re going to call it the Blood of Jesus! And it’s bad,” she said. Tink felt the side effects within hours of the first treatment. She had five rounds of it spaced out every two weeks.
The baby’s due date was February 19, 2017, but doctors decided to deliver him by cesarean section four weeks early, January 19.
Tink beamed as she said, “He was perfect! Nothing was wrong with him! 5 pounds, 6 ounces.” He was jaundiced but treated in the hospital. When Mama was discharged, so was he. Joelsten is now 6 years old. His older brother Joel is 16, and sister Aniyah is 13.
Tink began another round of chemo in March of 2017. She had PET scans and MRIs every three months. In November that year she received a call from her oncologist’s nurse with news of more cancer. “They found lesions on my brain. I cried.”
She called her friends in Pink for Tink, a Facebook group designed specifically for the journey Tink was on, who prayed for their friend. She remembers the day she entered UMMC for radiation treatments to begin. “The doctor came in and said ‘did you walk in here?’ Yes sir. ‘Did they roll you in a wheelchair?’ No sir. ‘Well looking at how many lesions are on your brain and looking at you someone should have rolled you in here this morning’…but I walked in there. I had no dizziness, anything. I had no clue. He said there were like 10 to 12 cancer lesions on my brain—so many they couldn’t go in and zap them out. I had to do full brain radiation quickly for 14 days – Saturday and Sunday exempt – it was extensive.” She described the head covering like a “Jason” mask from the “Halloween” movies.
The breast cancer spread to the right side so Tink’ surgeon recommended a bilateral mastectomy. In addition, she was advised against reconstruction because she learned the more your body is opened surgically the more the cancer is prone to spread. On February 14, 2019, she was told the breast cancer was gone; on March 5 she rang that bell!
In May 2019 Tink went back on chemo because it was still in her bones; she still has treatments every three weeks, completing number 99 on October 3, 2023. Every three months she still goes in for PET scans and MRIs. And Tink has continued to work through it all as the ISS teacher at Mendenhall High.
Tink says, “My baby saved my life. The doctor said if I hadn’t gotten pregnant they wouldn’t have found it as fast. She said you need to call him your ‘hero.’ So I call him my little hero.”
Early on Tink did ask the question, why me? But as her journey continued she said she understood more and more how God has used her to help other women on the same walk and other similar circumstances. “And I’m like wow! I don’t ever want to miss the opportunity for somebody to see a miracle and touch one.” She knows nothing is impossible with God. Tink has had several occasions to speak and share her story in church as well as on the news.
Tink is looking forward to her future. All three of her kids are involved in many extracurricular school activities including basketball, football, band and cheer. “It’s a joy to be able to be there with them and they can look in the stands and see Mama is here. That’s my motivation – ‘you gotta live because those babies are depending on you’.”
“For the women out there, if something doesn’t feel right, do not sleep on it. Please go to the doctor and it may not be anything. I listened to my body and kept going back.”
