It wasn’t the road he expected to travel when he entered Burroughs High in the Fall of 2024.
But junior Xavier Christensen is grateful for what he has, even if his high school journey has taken an untraditional route.
After a successful freshman year, which included playing football and winning the Pacific League title in the frosh-soph 200 and 400 meters in track, he was getting ready for his sophomore year.
He went to get his routine physical that would allow him to play sports for yet another year.
But his physical exam turned out to be anything but the norm.
Something that didn’t look right was discovered.
“I had noticed a month or two prior that one of my abs was bigger than the rest and when I laid down in certain ways there was something moving behind. I didn’t quite know what it was,” Christensen said. “But when I got my physical done to get cleared for football, the person doing the procedure said that this is not normal. You have to get an ultrasound immediately. I did the ultrasound and I think it was a 10 or 12-centimeter mass that they found. They said you need to go to the ER (emergency room) immediately.”
What should have been a routine summer weekend for a teenager turned into a nightmare.
“They did like CT scans and they still didn’t know what it is but they are still concerned, (and they say) we are going to admit you to the hospital,” Christensen recalled. “This is all within one day. A day or two later I’m getting a surgical biopsy, the first time I’ve had surgery in my life. It was done on a Friday, so I had to wait an entire weekend to get the results back.”
The results showed Christensen had stage four Desmoplastic Small Round Cell Tumor or DSRCT.
It is a rare and aggressive soft tissue sarcoma that primarily forms multiple tumors in the abdomen and pelvis. It affects just one in every five million people.
“The main mass was in my abdomen and it had fused with the spleen and it had metastasized in the form of a bunch of tiny tumors throughout the entirety of my liver. The doctors told me I wouldn’t live more than three to five years of my life,” Christensen said.
So Christensen, who missed his entire sophomore year as a student at Burroughs, began treatment in an effort to beat the disease.
“I was drinking this Chinese herbal medicine to help with the liver because that could not be done through chemo. They didn’t know how they were going to take care of the liver but it kind of took care of itself,” said Christensen, who followed up with chemotherapy.
Fortunately, the chemotherapy worked.
“Within six months of chemotherapy, it was small enough to surgically remove,” Christensen said of the tumor. “It did come with the cost of my spleen. I no longer have my spleen, so I have to take penicillin twice a day, but it’s not that big of a deal.”
He credits his mother Rachel and countless others for helping him along the way.
“I have to give all the credit to my mom. She put in so much work researching the best possible way to defeat this thing. She found literally the number one surgeon in the entire country to work on me,” said Christensen who went to New York for surgery. “It was a surgeon who had been very familiar with this cancer before and done surgeries with countless patients with the same type of cancer.”
Back at Burroughs, track teammates made bracelets on his behalf as he fought for his life.
“I’m incredibly grateful to have such a supportive community. It’s not something everybody has in their lives. I literally had thousands of people around the world behind me cheering me on. It feels great to be so loved,” Christensen said.
Christensen, who kept up his academics through online learning as a sophomore, said he is now completely clear and shows no evidence of having the disease.
“The way I like to phrase my journey is I was told I wouldn’t live five more years of my life and I beat my cancer in less than half of one. I was declared negative within six months of my diagnosis,” he said.
Now he is hoping to build up enough strength to getting back to play sports.
“As far as the weight I lost, I started out the treatment at about 150 pounds. I think I got down to like 125, maybe even a bit lower at one point. A big thing about chemo and radiation is that I had no appetite. It was hard to eat food for me and it still does. I’m technically still recovering from the treatment,” Christensen said.
Burroughs coach Jose Calzadilla said he loves what Christensen brings to his team.
“His journey has been amazing. With his fight against cancer and overcoming it, he has shown amazing courage and we are happy to have him out here,” Calzadilla said “We’re hoping to get him in a game, but he’s a little bit behind everyone else. He’s fighting hard and is always asking questions.”
Christensen said he’s hoping that with lots of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and portion shakes, he can eventually get back to where he would like to be.
“My goal weight is 185. If I was 185, I think I’d be an absolute beast,” he said.
