Phumeza and Shota Mdabe speak out on their baby boy’s struggle with eye cancer
The celebrity couple have had to take time out of the spotlight to look after their son but they’re now back in the grind. Phumeza plays Anele in SABC3’s Isidingo and has also collaborated with her hubby on a new song, Injabulo, which means happiness. “We’ve been through a lot and this is our time to be happy. Things are fine at home. We’re happy. When Mpilo was born he brought sunshine into their lives. “We were very happy,” Phumeza says. “Shota had just finished paying lobola, so it was a nice surprise.” But a year later their little boy was diagnosed with eye cancer. They were devastated. Mpilo (now 6) was born two weeks before his due date, weighing 3,7kg. He was their pride and joy, but they worried about him.
“His irises were pitch black. I remember asking my wife why his eyes were awkward,” Shota recalls. “They weren’t warm.” As he grew older, Mpilo’s eyes became squint and whenever they took a photo of him, a white dot would appear in his eyes on the picture. “Since I don’t know my biological father, I thought maybe his eye colour was changing to blue or green,” Phumeza says. They went to see an optometrist when Mpilo was a year old to get his squint fixed. “He said the bridge of Mpilo’s nose is going to grow and pull his eyes back into the proper position.
Yet three months later, they noticed their son was suddenly feeling his way a r o u n d t h e house when he walked. “We thought he needed glasses.” In December 2014 they took Mpilo back to the optometrist. “We wanted to get his eyes fixed as a Christmas present.” But he was referred to an eye specialist at Johannesburg Eye Hospital for further examination. Three days before Christmas Mpilo was diagnosed with a rare form of eye cancer called bilateral retinoblastoma. The devastated parents were told the cancer had spread through the optic nerve on the right eye. “They said they can try to save the left eye but can’t promise us anything.” Mpilo was referred to Life Fourways Hospital for MRI scans to check if the cancer had spread elsewhere in his body. “The cancer was at stage 4 – we thought he was already dying,” Phumeza recalls.
On 31 December, he started chemotherapy but doctors couldn’t save his eye. “I was looking at him thinking, ‘My son doesn’t know what awaits him’. He was about to lose his eye and there was nothing we could do to save it,” Shota says. They wanted “the pain to go away” but they had to be strong for Mpilo and his three siblings, Sibusiso (25), Khumo (13) and Mpho (11). The two eldest kids are from Shota’s previous relationship.
Two years later, Mpilo’s health took a turn for the worse. “We had to fly to Cape Town to get radiation. Mpilo had been through chemo, but his eye was red,” Phumeza recalls. The couple was left with a tough decision when doctors told them he wasn’t responding to the treatment. They chose to remove Mpilo’s other eye. “We wanted him to be free of cancer. He was in pain and it was also a danger to his life.” After the surgeries, Mpilo received prosthetic eyes that cost R50 000. Despite all the hospital visits he was lively and kept their spirits up. “He was carrying on with his life. He was playing like any normal child,” Phumeza smiles. “We’d walk around the hospital with the drip in his arm. He didn’t want to sit on his bed. He would vomit and be out playing five minutes later. “He really helped us get through this.
