Lessons from a cancer survivor

You realize just how precious life is when you’re on the brink of death. That’s exactly how (breast) cancer survivor Maritoni Fernandez feels these days.

Looking as healthy as ever, Maritoni has emerged from her one-year ordeal a totally changed person.

Before cancer dealt her an unexpected blow, Maritoni was Ms. Perfectionist.

"I refused to leave the house unless my bed was all made up. Every time I see the TV remote control lying around, I’d put it back in its place. I’d flare up when the cameras fail to start grinding after call time," she describes her old self.

Maritoni has a whole litany to tell.

"If I go to Hong Kong, I want everything in place: a good flight, a good hotel. The itinerary must be ironed out."

She was the typical first-born who must always be in control, a Ms. Fix-It on whose shoulders fell the responsibility of taking care of her broken family.

Maritoni came on too strong some showbiz insiders even labeled her a difficult person and steered clear of her.

Little did she know that this strength of character had a purpose. In one snap of a finger, her rosy world would cave in when a team of doctors in the US told her, "Yes, you have cancer. And we don’t know how long you will live until we perform a second surgery."

This time, Maritoni had to summon all the strength she can muster to face the biggest battle of her life. Her mom, whom she visited in the US because she was misdiagnosed of an illness, was devastated.

But it was Maritoni who held her chin up high and comforted the distraught mom.

"I can take it," Maritoni reassured her worried mother.

And she did. Maritoni endured chemotherapy in the US (West Virginia) once every three weeks. Never mind if she felt like vegetable, unable even to bring herself to the bathroom, for several days on end.

It took just one look at her then six-year-old daughter Alexia, to perk her up.

"I’m not afraid of death. The world is so full of problems. I even see it as the chance to see my deceased love ones. They will meet me in the Great Beyond," relates Maritoni, the born fighter.

But when she saw her daughter, things changed. She explained to the little girl that "the lump in Mommy’s breast has bad guys and they’re out to kill Mommy."

Then, she grit her teeth and faced her enemy squarely. Maritoni mockingly called her new bald look "the chemo-do." She accumulated all sorts of hats, one of them a fancy Christian Dior creation from a friend.

As we know by now, Maritoni not only beat cancer – thankfully arrested at its earliest stage. She also emerged from it a better person.

"A lot of us tend to forget how precious each moment is – no matter where we are or what we’re doing. I’d like to tell them, ‘Hey, it’s ok to do that thing you’ve never done before, stuff you’ve been putting off for so long!" says Maritoni.

She no longer checks if her bed is made up before leaving the house. It will only add to the stress.

"I treat everyday as if it were my last. I live for the moment," says she.

Maritoni plans to go to a tattoo artist in Boracay, and get herself a real tattoo, not the kind she got from a small incision on her breast.

Her concept of earthly belongings have changed a lot too.

She has learned to live on a lot less, like two weeks worth of clothes for an unexpected one-year stay in the US (where she learned of her then serious illness).

When she returned home last December, Maritoni was amazed at how many clothes she had in her walk-in closet. Realizing she didn’t need that much, Maritoni decided to give many of them away.

The same thought of how excessive her lifestyle has been struck her when she looked at her wall-to-wall CD collection, "80 percent of which I don’t listen to anyway."

The futility of accumulating things dawned on her like a bolt of lightning. Only recently did Maritoni realize "my lipstick collection is enough to fill up a boutique!"

She looked at her well-stocked makeup kit and chuckled, "Why do I have this? A professional will do my makeup when I get to the set anyway!"

Now, she’s easier on her daughter.

"When she wants to go swimming, I let her. You see, she’s starting to show signs of being a perfectionist herself," Maritoni goes on.

So, lest her daughter grow up to be a Type A kind of person like she was, Maritoni started teaching the little girl how to relax and enjoy life.

"You work, work, work to buy, buy,buy. Then, you get sick and others will enjoy what you’ve worked so hard for. They will even fight over it. What’s the use?" shrugs Maritoni.

Two years after she made her last movie, Ayos Na ang Kasunod, Maritoni is raring to make a showbiz comeback. Maritoni signed up under ALV Productions upon the prodding of friend Dina Bonnevie, whose daughter Danica Sotto, is with the same management outfit (together with Niño Alejandro, Rachel’s cousin).

Maritoni is raring to take on the challenge of playing good girl for a change in a GMA soap (she was the ruthless Ruth in the Sunday drama series Anna Karenina, remember?)

Another prospect is playing villain again in another soap.

But her dream is a hosting stint because "I love to pick other people’s brains and each one has a story to tell."

She also wants to put the story of her life in a book to inspire everyone fighting the same battle she won.

Two New Year’s Eves ago, Maritoni made a prayer list.

"You have given me everything: a happy family, financial security, the works. I have no enemies to bother me," she recalls telling God.

Then, a thought crossed her mind and she prayed, "Show me my purpose. Let me maximize the big influence I play on others as a showbiz personality."

Today, that purpose is as clear to her as day.

"Early detection is the key to beating breast cancer," she tells women over and over.

There. Straight from the horse’s mouth. Nothing else comes closer to gospel truth.