In June 2017, Michelle James, of Hepzibah, West Virginia, felt something was off as she prepared for her summer dance recital. But she couldn’t put her finger on the problem.

“I started dancing at age 2. By 16, it was second nature for me. So, it was hard for people who didn’t see me dance often to tell that something was wrong,” says Michelle, now 24. “But leading up to that recital, I noticed I wasn’t feeling well during practices. I didn’t feel sick, but I didn’t feel like myself. I felt exhausted, got short of breath easily, and was having terrible migraines.”

Unfortunately, her initial doctor’s appointments revealed more questions than answers. Lab results pointed to either leukemia or anemia.

“At 16, I didn’t even know what leukemia or anemia was,” she says. “I just knew that the look on my mom’s face told me everything.”

With no conclusive diagnosis, Michelle and her family drove the hour to the WVU Medicine J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital emergency room. After five hours of more testing, doctors strongly suspected cancer and admitted Michelle for immediate care.

A Rollercoaster Journey for Treatment

A bone marrow biopsy confirmed Michelle had acute lymphoblastic leukemia. With that diagnosis, Patrick Tomboc, DO, division chief of WVU Medicine Children’s pediatric hematology and oncology, started Michelle on a two-year treatment plan.

Ultimately, she had three 30-day hospitalizations for high-dose chemotherapy, underwent 84 chemotherapy treatments with methotrexate and other types of chemotherapy, and had seven biopsies to track her response to care. Initially, her progress was positive.

“During my first month in the hospital, I told my nurses and doctors that I felt like I was cheating cancer. I didn’t feel sick and wasn’t losing my hair. I was responding well to treatment,” she says. “By that August, another biopsy showed I was in remission.”

That’s when Michelle says things started to go downhill.

After another round of chemotherapy, she developed methotrexate toxicity. Doctors admitted James to the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) and put her on life support. While in a medically-induced coma, she started continuous dialysis to fight her kidney failure. To give her body time to heal, they stopped all chemotherapy. Fortunately, another biopsy in October 2017 revealed Michelle remained cancer-free, and she went home in time for Halloween.

Another Bump in the Road

For five years, Michelle stayed in remission. She graduated from high school with her class, returned to dancing, started college, and met her boyfriend. Her health was so good that, in December 2022, Dr. Tomboc scheduled her for less frequent appointments. He was optimistic she could stop taking daily chemotherapy pills.

“Dr. Tomboc wanted me to come off my maintenance pills, so he ordered some baseline testing. One came back and showed that my levels had skyrocketed,” she says. “At first, he thought it was a lab error. But a repeat test returned with the same results. That’s when he reached out to other doctors to decide how to proceed.”

Another bone marrow biopsy was the next step. This time, the diagnosis was chronic myeloid leukemia. Initially, Michelle had several concerns. In addition to the new disease, she was in her last semester of nursing school and feared another cancer battle would derail her education. She was also 23 and worried she would need to pivot from her pediatric cancer care team to adult oncology.

“Chronic disease sounded scarier in my brain. But Dr. Tomboc explained that the treatment was simple,” she says, noting that she wouldn’t need to switch to another doctor. “With a new chemotherapy pill, I could continue with school and keep living my life.”

That plan worked well for eight months. Then, Michelle stopped responding to chemotherapy. Her only other treatment option was a bone marrow transplant at another facility. She says being in a quarantine setting for the transplant and returning to treatment felt like she was putting her life on hold and going back to square one.

“Fortunately, I didn’t hit nearly as many speed bumps along the way with the transplant,” she says. “And I’ve done really well since then.”

Turning Sickness into Inspiration

Today, Michelle is a nurse on the medical oncology floor at Ruby Memorial Hospital and an ambassador for the WVU Cancer Institute Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Cancer Program. AYA provides support and resources to teens and young adults in cancer treatment.

Nursing isn’t the career she expected for herself in childhood. But she says life has a way of changing your path and goals.

“I never thought I was going to be a nurse. Growing up, my grandma told me I had a special touch with kids. So, when I went to college, I initially tried psychology to work with children,” she says. “But that quickly changed. I looked at my mom one weekend and said, ‘I fought cancer, so I shouldn’t be afraid to try nursing school. It can’t be that bad.’”

James says she drew her career inspiration from the nurses who cared for her.

“During my treatment, my nurses became my best friends. They were a big part of my support system,” she says. “They were like the stepping stones to nursing school for me.”

James models her approach to nursing after the compassionate, knowledgeable care she received from her nurses and Dr. Tomboc. From their example, she learned how to make a positive impact on her patients’ lives.

“On a daily basis, it’s the little things we do,” she says. “We can give our patients normalcy in a very not normal time. Ultimately, those small things can mean so much.”