RELAY PHOTO GALLERY: Cancer survivor a ‘living, breathing miracle’
Published 9:57 am Monday, August 3, 2009
Michelle Sundlie knows how to light up a room. Her cheerful attitude and year-round costume earned her the nickname “Elf” at Mayo Clinic.
Sundlie, 37, is a “walking, living, breathing miracle,” her mother, Elaine Kitselman, says.
Now a 12-year survivor of osteogenic sarcoma, a bone cancer rarely found in adults, Sundlie is also a veteran of the Mower County Relay for Life. She led the procession of Captain Atom’s Cadets members around Mill Pond Saturday night, emphatically ringing bells and chanting the team’s marching songs. She and her mother sold vendor and raffle tickets at the information booth for the day.
Sundlie’s family was told there was a 1 percent chance she would survivor her cancer.
While living with a sister in Oklahoma, Sundlie fell and hurt her leg, and was examined by a doctor. Unfortunately the non-cancerous leg was X-rayed, so she was not diagnosed until much later. She still does not know why she developed the disease, and was declared cancer-free the day before Thanksgiving in 1997.
Sundlie cannot bend her leg, which was fitted with a plastic knee. A broken hip contributed to slow rehabilitation.
More than 12 years later, Sundlie’s been “booted” out of Mayo Clinic, Kitselman said, because she no longer needs regular checkups to see if the cancer has resurfaced.
In her year at the clinic, Sundlie earned the name “Elf” for dressing in costume year-round, including for St. Patrick’s Day and Halloween. Her goal was to put a smile on each child’s face, despite their sometimes dire circumstances.
Critical of “sourpuss adults” in general, Sundlie made one clinic patient turn his frown upside down, she said.
In for his fourth bypass surgery, the man grumbled about the appointment.
“I handed him a guardian angel statue … I said, ‘You make sure your wife puts this on your desk.’ He cheered right up,” Sundlie recalled.
“He said, ‘Now I know I’m going to be OK,’” Kitselman said. “The guardian angel saved him.”
Today, Sundlie works at Top Flight Laundry Service for Cedar Valley Services Inc. in Austin. She lives in a group home and regularly attends Grace Lutheran Church with her mother. They are both loyal bell-ringers for the Salvation Army.
Kitselman believes there is a reason cancer did not claim her daughter.
“She’s here to cheer people up,” she said. “That’s why she’s here.
“Believe, believe, believe,” Kitselman would like to tell those with cancer. “You are a whole person; you are not the cancer. Always walk with faith.”
Sundlie had just three words of recommendation:
“Fight for it!” she exclaimed, throwing her fist in the air.