Due To COVID-19, This Man Discovers He Has Brain Tumor Before It’s Too Late

This investor would have wallowed in self-pity after receiving one bad news after another. But he simply chose not to.

For Filip Lloi Wycoco, the 35-year-old president and founder of The Global Filipino Investors, getting infected with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) ended up being “a form of divine intervention” as his hospitalization led him to finding out about his brain tumor before it was too late.

It was on Dec. 5 when Wycoco learned that he contracted COVID-19. The next day, he was already admitted to the Gat Andres Bonifacio Memorial Medical Center in Tondo, Manila.

“Even if most think na bad luck ang COVID sa mundo (Even if most think that COVID is bad luck to the world), I think that for us, it can still be a form of a divine intervention. Imagine, hindi ako nagkakaroon ng any migraine in the past, so surprised din ako ng nalaman ko na may tumor ako (Imagine, I never had any migraine in the past, so I was surprised too when I learned about my tumor),” Wycoco told The Philippine STAR.

He recalled suffering from “almost all” COVID-19 symptoms – cough, night sweats, chills, a fever that caused his temperature to reach 39 degrees Celsius, and then loss of sense of smell and taste.

But it was the migraine that he experienced that finally “led us in finding out my brain tumor plus pneumonia as part of the complication I got for acquiring COVID.”

“I started to complain that I’m having headaches and can't sleep well at night. So the next day, I got a CT scan request from my doctor to check on my condition and then du’n na nalaman na may brain tumor ako (that’s when we learned that I had a brain tumor),”  Wycoco recounted.

 How he found out

His wife Jel was the first one to find out about the results of the CT scan, but she did not immediately tell him about it because he was still recovering from COVID-19. “It was my doctor who requested for my CT scan who told me about my tumor before I was discharged from the hospital,” he said.

Wycoco admitted that he was shocked upon hearing the news because of his lack of experience with migraines. But having just survived his bout with COVID-19, he said he felt positive enough to face another challenge in his life.

“My first reaction was if I was able to survive COVID then the brain tumor I got is also something that I should not worry about for my faith is bigger than my illnesses,” he said.

Wycoco was confined in the hospital for 15 days due to COVID-19, for which he luckily did not have to spend any money.

Need to operate soon

This allowed him to quickly coordinate with his doctors regarding brain surgery to be performed in another hospital before it was too late.

“We were told that we need to remove the tumor this month as the growth is bigger than they expected, so if imu-move pa siya (it will be moved) to the next months, then it will be fatal for me already or at least it will increase the chances na hindi maging OK ang turnout ng surgery (that the surgery will not turn out OK),” he disclosed.

The surgery was successfully completed last Jan. 11 at the Makati Medical Center. Wycoco admitted that his recovery from the operation was challenging because of the pain, which he said went away earlier than expected with the help of prayers.

“On the second day after the surgery, I just cried to my wife as I can’t handle the pain anymore, but the next day and deep conversations with God, nawala ‘yung pain na ‘yun (that pain was gone),” Wycoco said.

“Nagulat din kami ng wife ko sa nangyari kasi nga naiyak na lang ako sa sobrang sakit, plus five to seven days daw talaga na ganun mararamdaman ko (My wife and I were just surprised with what happened, because I could only cry out of so much pain, plus I was supposed to feel that way for five to seven days,” he added.

Instead of feeling sorry about his condition, Wycoco considered everything that happened as a “blessing in disguise” and now on his way to recovery.

“I’m still in recovery phase. Parts of my face is still swollen kasi nga (because) my brain was swollen prior the surgery so now that the tumor is gone, nag-start na din mawala ‘yung swollenness ng brain ko (the swollenness of my brain has begun to ease),” he said.

 Help from insurance, relative

 Wycoco said he had to stay in the hospital for another nine days and racked up a hospital bill of almost P600,000. However, his insurance covered all of his medical expenses and his relative helped out with the other costs.

As the president of a company that promotes financial literacy, Wycoco said he thought carefully about dealing with the medical expenses.

When he tested positive for COVID-19, he decided to be confined in the public hospital to avoid depleting his family’s savings.

“Kasi despite naman my position, I don’t want to lose all of our savings from it, so nagpa-confine ako sa government-run hospital, which is OK naman ‘yung experience (Despite my position, I don’t want to lose all of our savings from it, so I had myself confined in the government-run hospital, which is OK in my experience),” Wycoco said.

“I also teach these things din, so I have to make sure to practice what I preach —hospitalization doesn’t mean for someone to lose all of their life savings, we just need to prepare properly for it,” he added.

When The STAR first shared his story on social media and which went viral on Facebook, one comment caught Wycoco’s eye: “Mayaman ka kasi kaya mabubuhay ka talaga (You are rich that is why you will really live).”

In a Facebook post on Jan. 22, Wycoco acknowledged that this may be somewhat true given his present-day financial standing, but his experience going broke before and resorting to side gigs made him promise that “it will never happen again during my lifetime, not today and specially not until my children is in need of a decent lifestyle.”

He stressed the need to be financially prepared for unexpected crises. He noted that he paid an additional P3,000 a year so that his insurance would cover critical illness for up to P500,000.

“The strategy is to protect whatever savings we have today from circumstances that we can never expect to happen. The best term to use here is ‘we’re financially prepared and we are working hard to achieve the kind of lifestyle we have today,’” Wycoco said.

Wycoco said he got his coverage from Philam Life, but recommended to get proposals also from Sun Life Financial Inc. and Pru Life UK to see what will best fit the specific needs.

Two battles of his life

Wycoco considered this journey as winning the “two battles of his life” and plans to share his story of hope with more people by focusing more on motivational content and maybe releasing a book on what happened to him.

He also thanked his family for being supportive and for checking on him from time to time throughout both journeys. His family even offered healing masses for him and they have asked different people to offer prayers on his condition.

On Jan. 20, Wycoco shared on Facebook that the biopsy result showed a benign result – which “looks like my brain tumor is officially part of my past.”

On Jan. 25, he revealed also on Facebook that the staple wires were finally removed from his scalp 14 days after his surgery.

 While the removal of the staple wires may seem painful, he stressed that he had already overcome a deadly virus and endured the pain with pain relievers, tears and prayers.

“If I was able to overcome the most painful moments of my life with God beside me, then why should I worry now?” he wrote.
“God will never want us to worry on our problems instead what He wants us to do is for us to try to appreciate every journey that we take whether it is a new form of an achievement or something that can cause us pain. Just take it in and always include God in all of your journeys.”