An ex-Victoria’s Secret model asking the public for prayer amid a Stage 4 cancer battle said she’s feeling “God’s love like never before.”
Nicole Weider, 38, discovered her cancer last month, and recently told CBN Digital about her journey, what’s ahead, and how she’s relying on her faith to get through the pain and uncertainty.
“Obviously, with the Stage 4 cancer diagnosis, I’ve been feeling so many different emotions,” she said. “Shock, at first, was my first emotion, and then I was feeling overwhelmed, and then I was feeling sad.”
Watch her discuss the ordeal:
Weider has been openly sharing her diagnosis and the resulting emotions, taking to Instagram to offer vulnerable and faith-filled updates. Over the years, the former model has built a platform based on her departure from the modeling world and her embrace of the Christian faith.
“I’ve already been public about my faith and being a Christian,” Weider said. “And so, when found out I had cancer, it just felt natural for me to share with people who have been following me … and also like writing about this is very freeing to me and it’s therapeutic.”
She said people’s prayers have been helpful as she has navigated so much unsureness.
Weider said one of the scariest parts of her cancer diagnosis is the fact she still feels entirely healthy. She had just had two full blood panels weeks before the cancer was discovered and nothing showed up on those tests.
It wasn’t until she found an enlarged lymph node and assumed she had an infection that she went to an urgent care location assuming she’d be given an antibiotic. It was there that doctors began to realize something far more troubling was unfolding.
“[The doctor] came in and he looked at it and he felt it, and he is like, ‘This doesn’t feel normal,'” Weider said. “And then he’s like, ‘I want to order you a full body scan.'”
Within 10 minutes, a radiologist came in and told her she had breast cancer — a statement that left Weider in total and utter shock. Struggling to process what was unfolding, she asked, “Are you joking?”
She also discovered the cancer had spread to her lymph nodes and liver. Weider was immediately admitted to a local hospital, where the diagnosis was confirmed and further information was given.
Weeks later, Weider is still making plans with doctors about the best course of treatment considering the severity and difficulties inherent in her case. Despite so much being up in the air, the wife and mother of two young kids said she has felt God with her along the way.
“What’s so interesting about it is, even though I have this diagnosis, I have felt God’s love like never before,” Weider said. “Almost like I feel God comforting me in such a big way.”
That comfort has come through fans, loving Christian chaplains who have offered prayer, and from other touchpoints through which she said the Lord has blessed her.
“It’s been all these little God things that have happened to me that I’m like, ‘I feel God’s presence throughout this process,'” she said. “And I’m just seeing God’s love like pop up in all these different ways, showing me that I’m not alone.”
Weider continued, “I know this is happening for a reason. God is with me. I trust Him.”
The former model asked those who hear about her story to pray for her and her family. She said the prayers and kind messages she has received on social media have helped keep her going and have further shown she’s not alone.
Weider also encouraged women to get checked and screened earlier than many doctors recommend. With her diagnosis coming right before her 38th birthday, she said she could have caught her cancer much earlier had she had a mammogram, which isn’t generally suggested for women under 40.
“I just recommend for women to get a mammogram or get an ultrasound of their chest, because they can save their life,” she said. “And I wish I had.”
Continue to pray for Weider as she begins treatment and continues on this difficult journey. You can follow all of her updates here.
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