Teen diagnosed with rare cancer after noticing lump on her hand
Morgane Grappy was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma days before her 14th birthday
A 15-year-old girl has just celebrated entering the new year cancer-free after being diagnosed with a rare and aggressive childhood cancer.
Morgane Grappy, from East London, was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma on July 19, 2024, after noticing a lump on the palm of her right hand.
A competitive cheerleader for eight years, Morgane was acutely aware of the condition of her hands, and her quick action when she noticed something was wrong may have saved her life.
Now, after 14 months of intensive treatment including chemotherapy, radiotherapy and surgery on her hand, Morgane is back to cheerleading on the international stage, and studying to sit her GCSEs this summer, despite missing the whole of Year 10 while she was unwell.
In May 2024, Morgane, then 13, was cheerleading at a competition in Florida, in the US, when she noticed something was wrong with her right hand.
“My hand was hurting, but I didn’t really think anything of it,” she said.
“I didn’t feel anything. I was just getting on with it.
“Then, around a month after I got back, I noticed a lump and we went to the GP, who told us to get an ultrasound.
“We got an ultrasound and they didn’t really identify anything. So then we went to have a biopsy, and we found out everything.”
A week before her 14th birthday, Morgane had a general anaesthetic for the biopsy on her palm. A few days afterwards, her mother Claire received a phone call that destroyed her world: she was told that Morgane had rhabdomyosarcoma, a rare cancer of the soft tissue, and she needed urgent treatment.
Claire was then faced with a difficult decision. Morgane had an important cheerleading competition that weekend, one she had been working towards for months, and she knew that telling her the terrible news would destroy her chances of success.
She decided to go with the alternative – to keep the news from her daughter so she could focus on her competition, and they could deal with what came next together.
“It was the worst 72 hours of my life,” Claire said.
“She kept smiling at me, and I’m like: I know that you have cancer, and I can’t tell you.
“It was just very, very sad.”
When Morgane was told the news, she “didn’t know how to react”. She knew she would have to stop cheerleading while she had treatment, and would miss out on a pivotal year of school, and seeing her friends.
“It was really hard, because I was going into the gym and supporting my team and everything, but it was just so hard watching them, knowing that I can’t do this at the moment,” she said of having to stop cheerleading.
Morgane’s treatment began on August 8, 2024, and involved chemotherapy for two days per week every three weeks, and 24 cycles of radiotherapy, every day for five weeks.
She also needed to undergo another operation, a biopsy on her lymph nodes in her underarms, to check that the cancer had not spread.
Thankfully it had not – doctors had caught it early.
Even with the cancer confined to her hand, the treatment was brutal for the 14-year-old.
“I lost all my hair, basically every single hair on my body,” she said.
“I was always quite sick, and I was really fatigued most of the time. Luckily, I actually didn’t lose that much weight.”
As she reached the end of her treatment, in September 2025, Morgane was due to have another operation, this time to remove any parts of the tumour left in her palm.
An MRI scan showed that her treatment had completely eradicated the tumour, but she opted to go ahead with the surgery for her own peace of mind, removing tissue around where the tumour had been, to ensure there were no cancerous cells remaining.
Finally, Morgane could ring the bell and begin to get her life back post-cancer.
Morgane and her family are grateful to the “literally incredible” nursing team at UCLH who helped care for her with empathy, kindness and dedication, and whose hard work meant she could now return to normal life: seeing her friends more regularly, going back to cheerleading, and returning to school to face her all-important GCSE exams.
Morgane returned to cheerleading in May 2025, and after three weeks she was performing a full routine alongside her squad – an offer from her coach that made her “burst into tears”.
Symptoms of rhabdomyosarcoma
NHS Inform
The most common symptom is a lump or swelling.
Other symptoms will depend on the part of the body:
- a tumour in the head or neck area can sometimes cause a blockage (obstruction) and discharge from the nose or throat; occasionally, an eye may appear swollen and protruding
- a tumour in the abdomen (tummy) can cause pain or discomfort in the abdomen and difficulty going to the toilet (constipation)
- a tumour in the bladder may cause symptoms such as blood in the urine and difficulty passing urine (peeing)
Despite the fact that Morgane had missed the whole of Year 10 at school – she would pop in at lunchtimes to see her friends a couple of times a month, but was otherwise focused on her treatment – she decided to dive straight into Year 11 and prepare for her GCSEs when she returned in September 2025.
“One of my teachers did say to me, when I was in Year 10: ‘Are you going to resit the whole of Year 10?’ I was like: ‘Not at all’,” Morgane said.
“I wanted to get through Year 11 and pass all my GCSEs.”
“It’s actually not as hard as I thought it would be,” she added.
“There is stuff where I do think: ‘Woah, this is overwhelming’, like I’m getting ten emails to do all this homework. But overall, I’m actually happy to be back and be back in my own routine. And my grades are actually very good.”
Morgane has been accepted at the Retail Fashion Academy in Moorgate for September, and now all she has to do is get the grades required – and she’s well on track.
She has also been honoured with a Cancer Research UK Star Award, which recognises the courage shown by children and young people facing cancer, as she moves into a new year cancer-free.
Morgane said: “I definitely think it taught me who my real friends are, and it just taught me to live life as much as I can, and appreciate my health.”
Morgane is raising awareness of the Cancer Research UK for Children & Young People Star Awards. They celebrate the courage of children who have been diagnosed with cancer.
For more details and how to nominate, visit: cruk.org/starawards.
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