“Throughout every part of my treatment, my whole care team was totally in sync. Dr. Cann always knew what Dr. Farma and Dr. Castellanos were doing, and vice versa. I never had that anxious feeling of wondering whether my doctors had talked to each other.”‐Kristen Costello
I’m 28 years old, born and raised in South Philly. I went to Kutztown University of Pennsylvania and graduated in 2019 with a bachelor’s in communication design. These days I work on the user experience team at JPMorgan Chase.
Before my life changed unexpectedly, I was completely healthy. At every checkup, they’d basically shoo me out the door almost as fast as I walked in. I’m active, and I have no family history of colon cancer. My cancer diagnosis just came out of nowhere.
Something Wasn’t Right
In February 2025, I started feeling off. I was still going to Pilates every day, but instead of my body getting stronger, the weights in my hands felt heavier and heavier. My bowels weren’t working right. I was tired all the time.
Initially my primary care team thought it might be constipation, but several weeks later I still wasn’t feeling any better. I couldn’t get an appointment with a GI specialist for months, so eventually I felt bad enough that I went a local emergency room.
Bloodwork was the first sign of trouble. My hemoglobin was at 6 g/dL — it should be between 12 and 15 — so I needed blood transfusions right away. Over the next five or six days I spent in the hospital, they did an endoscopy and a colonoscopy, and that’s when they found a mass in my colon. Scans afterward showed spots on my liver.
Ultimately, I was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer that had spread to my liver. I was 27 years old.
Choosing Fox Chase
After I was discharged from the hospital I was initially treated at, my family and I wanted a second opinion. My grandmother had been treated for lung cancer at Fox Chase, so my dad was familiar with the center and trusted it.
A few of our neighbors who worked in healthcare told us about Dr. Christopher Cann, a medical oncologist at Fox Chase. As soon as my family sat down with Dr. Cann, we felt the difference. My parents, my brother, my boyfriend and I all had a ton of questions, and Dr. Cann sat with us for as long as it took to provide answers. We never felt rushed.
Dr. Cann also told me about the Young Adult Cancer Program, which he developed at Fox Chase specifically for younger cancer patients like me. The program includes a support group that holds different educational events and connects you with other young people who understand what you’re going through.
Hearing about this program gave me even more of an incentive to choose Fox Chase. If Dr. Cann felt passionate enough to create this type of program for people like me, that’s who I wanted to treat my cancer.
Surgery and Cutting-Edge Chemo Delivery
As my medical oncologist, Dr. Cann oversaw my treatment plan and chemotherapy. In our original plan, I’d have six rounds of chemo, followed by a combined surgery on both my colon and liver, followed by six more rounds of chemo. However, imaging showed that the tumor in my colon had grown dangerously large, so Dr. Jeffrey Farma, Chair of the Department of Surgical Oncology, made the call to do surgery on my colon right away.
I was scheduled for six rounds of chemo after my colon surgery, but before we started, Dr. Cann asked whether I wanted to freeze my eggs in case I wanted to get pregnant later. My mom and I had discussed it, but I was still on the fence. His bringing it up and reassuring me that it wouldn’t create unnecessary risk gave me the confidence I needed to go ahead. That process took two weeks, and then I was able to begin chemo.
After the chemo, I had liver surgery with my other surgical oncologist, Dr. Jason Castellanos. He removed four small tumors and implanted a hepatic arterial infusion pump on the left side of my abdomen. The device is about the size and shape of a hockey puck with a cord attached. It was loaded with chemotherapy drugs and delivered treatment straight to the liver. This was in addition to the chemo I received through the port in my chest, so I basically had a double dose working at the same time: broader chemo through my port and more targeted chemo through the pump.
It’s important for me to say that throughout every part of my treatment, my whole care team was totally in sync. Dr. Cann always knew what Dr. Farma and Dr. Castellanos were doing, and vice versa. I never had that anxious feeling of wondering whether my doctors had talked to each other. They all agreed on the plan, and they communicated it clearly. The reassurance I felt from that was huge.
One Year Later
I finished my final round of chemo almost exactly a year after my diagnosis. The HAI pump will stay in for another two years as a precaution, along with my port. Otherwise, my life looks a lot like it used to. I feel genuinely good. Healthy.
There’s one thing Dr. Cann said to me in one of our early appointments that I’ve carried with me this past year: “This won’t be your life. This will just be part of your life.” He was right. I’ve had hard days where I’m angry and asking why this happened to me. But most of the time, my mindset is that this is just what’s happening right now, and, thanks to Fox Chase, I’m getting through it. It’s part of my story, but it’s not the ending.
Learn more about treatment for colon cancer at Fox Chase Cancer Center.