Ana C. | 2025 All Star | Connecticut Children's Foundation

The art of perseverance

It was the middle of tennis season when Ana began experiencing pain in her leg. “It kind of felt like growing pains or like a sports injury. I couldn’t straighten or bend it fully. I was limping a lot,” she said. Despite the pain, she was cleared to play tennis for Middletown High School and advised to see a doctor. X-rays did not reveal anything concerning, but an orthopedist suggested that Ana get an MRI. The MRI uncovered unwelcome news: there was a tumor on Ana’s distal femur, the part of her thigh bone that is just above the knee. The orthopedist referred her to Connecticut Children’s.

“I was just in shock,” remembered Ana. “It didn’t really set in for a long time.” It was not what her mother, Sonia, expected, either. “I didn’t want to believe it. It was really tough, something that no parent wants to hear,” Sonia said.

A summer of chemotherapy

At Connecticut Children’s, a biopsy was performed, and Ana’s tumor was diagnosed as osteosarcoma by Michael Isakoff, MD, Director of the Sarcoma Program at Connecticut Children’s Center for Cancer & Blood Disorders. Osteosarcoma is a type of cancer that begins in the bones.

Ana’s osteosarcoma was diagnosed in June. School was out, and instead of a carefree summer ahead of her, Ana was now looking at several months of chemotherapy to kill the tumor. The side effects were rough, especially the intense nausea, and her hair fell out. Eleven weeks after her first chemotherapy treatment, orthopedic oncologist Adam Lindsay, MD, performed surgery, removing the end of her femur along with the tumor and reconstructing her knee with a special type of knee replacement called a distal femoral replacement. Months of weekly outpatient physical therapy helped her regain strength and range of motion in her knee.

In September, Ana returned to school in person for her junior year, but ongoing chemotherapy treatments made it difficult to keep up. “I was in the hospital more than I was home,” she said. To accommodate her intensive chemotherapy cycles, she switched to home learning with a tutor. “It’s been hard,” she added, “but my school has been very accepting of my situation.” At the end of the year, an adverse reaction to a platelet transfusion landed her back in the hospital.

Inspiring others through art

Ana is a talented painter and crafter who works in multiple mediums. She was a natural for Bob Ross Day at Connecticut Children’s Family Resource Center, where she and several of the Child Life Specialists learned how to paint pumpkins and make dream catchers. A landscape she painted live at the 2024 Connecticut Children’s Golden Ticket Gala was auctioned off to benefit the hospital’s Greatest Need Children’s Fund and was purchased by UConn Men’s Basketball coach Dan Hurley and his wife Andrea Hurley, a volunteer in the Center for Cancer & Blood Disorders.

It comes as no surprise that Ana’s favorite subject at school is art and that she’s interested in becoming an art teacher—although her medical journey at Connecticut Children’s has sparked another career interest, too. “After working with the Child Life specialists, I think it would be pretty fun to be one,” she said. “I love working with kids, as well as art.”