'Coronavirus Be Damned. We're Going Go The ER'

HERNDON, VA — Chelsea Proctor's back began to hurt around the time the coronavirus pandemic started in January and coincided with her aging out of her parents' health insurance.

At first, Chelsea thought she'd just pulled a muscle. But the pain continued right into the lockdown in early March.

A graduate of Herndon High School and James Madison University, Chelsea was a graduate student a Johns Hopkins University, where she was pursing a degree in environmental sciences.

"We got her a standing desk so she didn't have to sit because she was uncomfortable sitting," said Rochelle Proctor, Chelsea's mother.

In those early days of the pandemic, it was difficult to schedule an appointment to see a doctor in person, so Chelsea Proctor had a virtual visit with her primary care physician around the end of April.

"They told her she probably just pulled something in her back or injured something," Rochelle Proctor said. "They recommended doing yoga, giving it time to heal, and maybe going into physical therapy."

After that initial appointment, the situation did not improve. In fact, according to her mother, Chelsea Proctor's pain worsened.

"She just said, 'Oh, I just need to give it time to heal,'" Rochelle Proctor said. "Then she started to have nerve pain down her leg. It felt like a pinched nerve all the time."

Following another virtual visit, Chelsea Proctor was x-rayed and the doctors thought she might be developing arthritis in her spine.

"It was getting excruciatingly painful. She wasn't getting any relief at all," Rochelle Proctor said. "One night, it got bad. She had some other symptoms. I actually thought she was having a stroke and didn't even think anything about cancer. She was pretty healthy, but her face on one side sort of drooped, so I got worried and said, 'Coronavirus be damned, we're going to the ER.'"

After examining Chelsea, seeing how much pain she was in, and noticing that her left side was paralyzed, the doctors at first thought it might be multiple sclerosis. She stayed in the hospital for a few days to undergo a series of MRIs.

After being examined by the oncologist and neurosurgeon at Inova Fairfax Hospital, Chelsea was scheduled for emergency surgery to decompress her spine.

"That would've been really bad because this tumor is in her lumbar and thoracic spine, so it's eaten up part of her vertebrae and a big part of her muscle," Rochelle Proctor said.

In preparation for surgery, the doctors had prescribed steroids, which succeeded in reducing the inflammation and pressure on Chelsea's spine enough so they could put the surgery on hold. Instead, they took the opportunity to perform a biopsy with the hope of identifying the tumor.

Two weeks later, the results came back. The diagnosis was Ewing's sarcoma, an incredibly rare and aggressive form of cancer. It's so rare that the family will be traveling Saturday to the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for a consultation.

"It's such a rare cancer that not many people in the world have it," Rochelle Proctor said. "It's less than 1,000 people have it."

The tricky part for the Proctors is that Chelsea's student health care won't cover the costs for the trip to Houston and many of the other expenses associated with her treatment. She's expected to endure at least 10 months of chemotherapy, followed by a difficult surgery, rehabilitation, and radiation treatment.

Recently, the Proctors launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise money to offset the expenses of Chelsea Proctor's treatment. As of 2:30 p.m. on Thursday, the campaign has raised more than $25,000 toward its $100,000 goal.

"The GoFundMe exists to help Chelsea with the extraordinary cost of saving her life," Rochelle Proctor said.

One of Rochelle Proctor's jobs is to keep her daughter positive and positively focused, which can be difficult given how much pain she has to endure even with the help of pain medication.

"At times, it takes her completely down," she said. "In those moments, she's in pain, but her spirits are pretty high and she's very hopeful that we'll figure this out and she will get to the other side."

For more on how to help Chelsea Proctor and her family, visit their GoFundMe campaign.