Meet Wedyan

An interview with an Iraqi refugee

One person is displaced from their home country every two seconds. This alarming statistic from a report conducted by the United Nations showed that in 2017, the number of refugees and people displaced by disaster and conflict worldwide reached a record high of 68.5 million.

I had the pleasure of sitting down and meeting an Iraqi refugee who left her home country in 2010 in search for a new life in America. A woman who’s strength and faith helped her gain access to her very own American dream.

With one hand on her stomach reaching out to the life that grows inside her swelling belly and the other clutching a photo of her deceased brother, Wedyan tells me her triumphant story. A story that involves war, illness, loss, and in the end birth, life, and gratuitous happiness.

Wedyan did not have a typical childhood. From a young age, she had her innocence stripped from her by the war that surrounded her. “When I was in elementary school there was war, I knew about missiles,” she said.

The war continued to effect her life, even in her later years. “I remember when I was in college, I saw a man, he covered everything,” she said. “I knew it was a man driving that car, I knew he’s from Al Qaeda, I knew it, because 5 minutes after, I heard an explosion.”

Although one might expect the war would swallow a child’s innocence, it was not what took Wedyan’s. Rather responsibilities stripped the young woman of her younger years. “I started to help my mother raise my siblings when I was 7 years old,” she said. “ I was cooking, cleaning and changing diapers at seven years old.”

“Every child would be out playing, but I never played with dolls,” she said. “My mother had five children, two boys and three girls, and I raised all of them, so I never had a normal childhood. I was always helping.

But Wedyan never let the responsibilities of family life get in the way of furthering her own education. “I used to put my book on top of the sink and study while I washed the dishes because that was the only time I had for my studies,” she said. “I took care of my siblings, I went to school, and I finished college.” A feat that is commendable throughout the world.

Through rigorous studies, Wedyan would go on to become a cardiology nurse. A task that gained backlash from many of those within her neighbourhood. “In my culture working means your family cannot support you,” she said. “My brother said “no no what will people think that you are working while going to college”, and I said “no”, I’ve never cared about what my culture thinks because I knew I wasn’t doing something wrong. I’m just working and studying.”

Despite the war growing around her, Wedyan got a degree, married and had two small children. But after the birth of her second, she was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer.

“The cancer I had is called carcinoid. My doctor told me it happens to people who deal with things and hold it in,” she said. “My nerve system produced this cancer.”

According to the Neuroendocrine Tumour Research Foundation, carcinoid tumours, which are often referred to as neuroendocrine tumours originate in the gastrointestinal tract, lungs, appendix and thymus but can also be in the lymph nodes, brain, bones, gonads, and skin. By nature these tumours grow slowly and are not always detected, making them incredibly dangerous to the unsuspecting.

After the birth of her daughter, Wedyan suspected there was something wrong with her body. “I lost weight a lot, I didn’t eat well, or drink well, and overnight I [would] get fevers,” she said. “I just didn’t pay attention because I was focused on my daughter.”

Due to these conditions she went to a doctor but was incorrectly diagnosed with acid reflux. When her symptoms did not go away, she saw another doctor, a doctor who found a tumour in her chest.

“In Iraq, when they found out that I had the tumour they told me I could not be treated,” she said. “So I went to the American Embassy clinic and got checked and they said 100% you’re going to get declined and not granted a visa because I was sick and they don’t allow anyone who’s sick to come to the United States.”

In hopes of gaining passage to the United States to get the life saving medical treatment Wedyan needed, her family applied for visas. She said, “it took us three years to get the visa, from 2009 to 2012 and during that time the Embassy held on to our passports.”

With the chance of being granted a visa looking bleak, Wedeln’s husband contacted the embassy with the hope of getting back the passports the embassy was holding hostage. “So my husband contacted the embassy and said, “I need our passports back my wife is very very sick I need to get her out of the country,” she said.

The family planned to go to Germany where they had relatives and knew of a doctor who had the necessary medical skills to treat her rare form of cancer. But when her husband, Ahmed, arrived at the embassy to collect the passports a miracle happened.

“Ahmed went to the Embassy to get the passports and when he was sitting in the waiting room he said a huge guy came to him and said “why are you waiting”, to which Ahmed said he was getting back their passports,” she said. “He did not say how his wife was sick or any details but miraculously the huge guy took the passports and stamped visa on all four of them. He was our angel.”

The happy news came when Wedyan was staying at her parents house, for she was too ill to care for her small children. “I was at my parents house very sick when Ahmed called me crying saying “the good things you have done in your life, everything is happening because of you,” she said. “They gave us the travel day, which was only a month and a half to get ready.”

So in a month, the young family of four packed up their lives and set off for America with Wedyan’s health scarcely holding on and treatment needed immediately. “They took the IV out of my hand an hour before I got to the airplane,” she said. “They kept the antibiotics and the IV until the last minute because I was so sick.”

She laughs as she said, “my husband was afraid that they were going to see the bruises and needle marks and think I was using drugs, and not let us travel”. The skin around her eyes crinkles as her eyes smile with a sadness that can only be described as a mix of reflection and excitement. “But they did, we left our life and our families in Iraq,” she said.

Upon arriving in America, Wedyan was treated for her cancer and has since been cancer free for several years. “I have had excellent check ups ever since,” she said. Although the cancer inside her no longer grows, Wedyan’s family continues to grow as she prepares for the birth of her third child.

With a growing belly and a house that bubbles over with the excited whispers of her son and daughter, Wedyan has built a life for herself that once didn’t seem possible. A life that is not a reality for the many refugees that seek asylum in other countries.

According to the American Immigration Council, Under U.S. law, a “refugee” is defined as a person who is unable or unwilling to return to his or her home country because of a “well-founded fear of persecution” due to race, membership in a particular social group, political opinion, religion, or national origin.

Wedyan, a sick woman with an unknown future ahead of her and a growing family, refused to let herself get swallowed in to the fears associated with war. Despite living a life of an unknown future, she did not crumble under the pressures of the unpredictable. Rather, she rose up and built a life, and is currently living her American dream.

With her pregnant belly pushed up against the table she said, “I never lost trust with people. I always have a positive thought and I always believe in trust. Even if something bad happens, and it takes years, in the end I will get something good.”

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