A little girl is now being treated for cancer in her eye because her mom trusted her instincts. Jasmine Martin had noticed a “small glow” in her daughter Sariyah’s eye, but on July 30th, it was bigger and looked “like a moon.” The mama from Knoxville, Tennessee turned to Facebook for advice and posted a photo and social media helped her figure it out. When several people commented that it could be cancerous, she took the tot to the pediatrician.
Sariyah’s doc told her that it was nothing to worry about, but her intuition didn’t agree. It was going to take weeks to get an appointment with an eye doctor, so Jasmine emailed the photo to a friend who works at a hospital and showed it to a doctor. And after they saw it, the little girl was taken to St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital that night. Sariyah has been diagnosed with bilateral retinoblastoma, a rare form of cancer in the retina.
Since then, the 17-month-old has been through ups and downs with her condition. The tumor in her right eye – the one with the large glow – is shrinking, but a tiny spot in her left eye that was laser-treated has returned. Despite it all, Jasmine says her daughter is “so happy, you wouldn’t even know she is going through this.” And the mom hopes that by sharing her story she will encourage other mothers to follow their instincts when it comes to their children’s health, adding, “Mothers just know.”
