Facing a Rare Cancer Diagnosis: My Journey with Myxofibrosarcoma Begins

New chapters.

The thing about new chapters is that sometimes the beginning and ends of chapters are a bit blurry; while others loudly pronounce their starts and ends. 

Monday June 2nd @ 12:32pm is the date and time that marked the loud arrival of a new and very unfamiliar chapter of my life.  It was the date and time my surgeon called me and shared the following: The pathology report on your cyst came back.  It had clear markers for cancer.  

The following conversation with her is a complete blur.  I heard only fragments of words and statements:  Rare sarcoma.  Boston.  Treatment. 

And with chapters that come with loud arrival, we sometimes have to go back to few to figure out how we got here.  So let’s do that:

It’s June 2024.  I’m carrying reams of paper to a counter in the teachers’ room at the high school I work at and I manage to hit my left elbow off the corner of a staff refrigerator.  And not just a casual and clumsy bump into this ancient appliance, I collided with such force I was most certain I broke my elbow.  

In August 2024, the pain from the collision subsided (and definitely no broken elbow) but I was left with a small bruise and bump that was easy to rationalize are the remnants of the injury.  By Christmas, the bruise is gone but I’m left with a bump that many of those in the medical community tell me is probably a cyst from the injury.  I get the distinct feeling it’s growing but dismiss it because eyes play tricks on you sometimes, right?

Now it’s March 2025 and my eyes are NOT playing tricks and the cyst has clearly grown; making it uncomfortable to do any forearm exercises in the gym and is beginning to interfere with bench pressing. I make an appointment to see my PCP who decides to x-ray my cyst and to refer me to an orthopaedic surgeon for consultation.  X-ray results conclude it’s a cyst.

I met with the orthopaedic team in April 2025 and got further imaging, this time an MRI, on the cyst.  MRI concludes it’s a cyst with some small concern about where it’s housing itself on my elbow.  The surgeon agrees to move forward with surgery with no concerns regarding the placement of where the cyst is on my elbow.

May 2025.  My cyst is officially named Larry from some of the best humans I get to workout with on Sunday mornings. 🙂  Surgery also takes place towards the end of the month.  Surgery went fine (with the exception that I hated wearing the cast for two weeks) and the surgeon shared post-op that the removal went well and that it looked like a cyst.  However, it would still be sent to pathology.

June 2025. Cancer. Myxofibrosarcoma (mix-O-fibro-sarcoma) to be specific and MFS for short.  A super rare sarcoma that typically affects older white males with a high re-occurrence rate.  In looking back, naming the cyst ‘Larry’ was a good choice. 🙂

I think the backstory is what makes this next chapter’s arrival such a jarring one; that I didn’t see it coming.  I also know I am not unique in this way.  Many others before me, and unfortunately after me, will receive this kind of news in the exact same way.   Nevertheless, being blindsided with news like this..I still have no words.

So what’s next?  A trip down to Boston to get more information and to learn what my treatment plan will be.  And then, I fight.  I will fight like hell to rid myself of this nasty sarcoma and the odds that it will come back.

And while I’m doing that, I will write.  Writing is something that brings me immense amounts of joy and groundedness and so I plan to share my journey of fighting and healing through my blog.  How frequently I write and to what length, I will figure out as I go.

What I am certain of though, is that while these updates will have a home on The Wandering Chickadee, I will NOT be sharing much of my journey on my social media platforms.  

If you already subscribe to The Wandering Chickadee, you will get my health updates in your email.  If you don’t, please drop your email address below as this is the only blog I will be publicly sharing.

As always, thank you for following along! It means the world!

~Natalie