I transferred here from a PWI, but I always planned on going to an HBCU right out of high school. I was actually scheduled to attend one until three weeks before my move in date. That’s when I found out that I had cervical cancer. After leaving the doctor’s office that day, I sat in the parking lot for, like, an hour, crying.

My dad is a pastor, so once I talked to him about my cancer, he told me to pray about it. I was really mean to him, actually, and said that you can’t pray about everything. But, my mom told me that he really didn’t understand because he hadn’t had any serious illness like that. My mom actually had cervical cancer when she was pregnant with me and she motivated me to just go on living my life like I was. She was living proof that it will affect your life but it won’t stop you from being great.

I got mad at my dad when he told me to pray about my cancer. But when I actually started praying about it and getting into the word about it, it really just taught me to keep my faith. The 13th is what me and my mom call my lucky day. I was born on October on Friday the 13th and on November 13, 2015, I found out that my cancer was in remission.”

– Destiny, junior marketing major from Baton Rouge, Louisiana