This Peloton Instructor Woke Up With a ‘Huge, Painful Lump’ on His Rib—and Began a New Medical Drama

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this-peloton-instructor-woke-up-with-a-‘huge,-painful-lump’-on-his-rib—and-began-a-new-medical-drama — This Peloton Instructor Woke Up With a ‘Huge, Painful Lump’ on His Rib—and Began a New Medical Drama

Bradley Rose, 38, is a UK-based Peloton instructor, NASM-certified personal trainer, and actor. He survived a stroke in 2019, and recently went through a cancer scare—and subsequent surgery to remove the benign sarcoma-like growth. Here’s his story, as told to writer Cindy Kuzma.

At the beginning of February, I woke up with a huge, painful lump on my rib. Just touching it hurt and I couldn’t sleep on that side.

I thought it was a gym-related muscle tweak. No big deal.

But the next morning, it was even more painful; it felt like I was being stabbed in the ribs. I literally could hardly breathe and everything felt like a struggle. My wife Sophia, who’s pregnant with our first child, said, “Look, just go to the doctor. It’s probably nothing, but let’s get it checked out.”

Six years ago, I had a stroke when a blood clot traveled to my brain because I was (unknowingly) born with two holes in my heart. At the time, I had a severe headache and fatigue, but didn’t get checked out straight away. So when my painful lump hadn’t improved after a day—in fact, it got way worse—I knew I needed to get to a doctor.

The doctor said I needed an urgent investigation. He requested for the National Health Service, Britain’s public healthcare system, to get me into an MRI machine to check things out. He didn’t know exactly what it was, but he did mention the word “sarcoma.”

I didn’t know what that meant, but I figured it was like a lump or a lipoma. The summer after I started at Peloton, in 2021, I had a little lump on my back. The doctor at the time said, “Oh, this is a lipoma. We’ll just pop it out.” The removal was simple, a tiny little incision, and after a few days of recovery I got back to life as normal. That’s kind of what I thought this was.

But this lump was a lot more painful, which had some alarm bells whirling in my head. As I walked out, I Googled “sarcoma.” And that turned out to be the worst thing to do. I read—and then spiraled. I had a full meltdown as I was walking to work about to teach a Peloton class.

Here’s what I learned: Sarcoma is a cancer of the bones or soft tissue. It can grow in or around the ribs, among other places. It’s aggressive and difficult to treat. There’s chemotherapy, and sometimes they have to remove ribs. Early detection is key. That was one positive that stuck with me. I had acted fast and was on the path to getting it sorted out.

Two days after that, I got an MRI. I hadn’t been in one of those machines since my stroke. Being strapped down in the narrow chamber brought all those memories rushing back. It’s terrifying being left alone for over an hour in there; your mind goes in all these different directions.

That and waiting for the results were the hardest parts. I had to go back to work and smile, be in front of thousands of people on a leaderboard, teach, and pretend everything was okay—but silently, this thing was growing inside of me and I didn’t know what it was.

To make matters worse, my wife is pregnant after many years of infertility. While all this was happening, we were in the middle of moving. It was mind-boggling to do it all at once: putting our stuff in storage, bouncing between family’s houses and hotels, living out of a suitcase while dealing with a possible cancer diagnosis and visits to my wife’s midwife.

Looking back on those classes during that time, I don’t think you could tell there was a difference in my work. But even as I was teaching a class, my mind was still like, What if this is cancer? You’ve got a baby on the way. What are you going to do? I even feared whether I’d be able to keep my job.

I only told one person at Peloton, and they never put any pressure on me. They said, “You don’t have to work. You can take the time off. What do you need?” Which was amazing and supportive.

But even though it was tough, I thought, I want to work, to keep busy. I can’t sit at home and stew. I was grateful to go in and have everybody treat me as normal. The doctor said I could take ibuprofen to manage pain, so I was doing that. It was uncomfortable but manageable.

A few days later, Sophia and I went back to the doctor and got my results. The doctor said he didn’t know what it was—the scan was inconclusive. But sarcoma was on the long list of potential diagnoses. Now, I knew a lot more about what that meant, and that it had the potential to spread.

So he gave a few options: We could biopsy it and then remove it if it was something serious, or just leave it and give it a few weeks to see what happens. But from his expertise, he recommended removing it and then doing the biopsy.

I didn’t want to test fate; I wanted it out of my body. I couldn’t carry around the stress and worry of leaving it in there. Surgery scares the heck out of me, but after talking with Sophia, I decided to move forward with it. Things moved fast, and it was booked for a few days later.

We moved out of our apartment the day before, which meant we were staying in a hotel the night before the surgery. The following morning, my wife and I checked into the hospital at 8:00 a.m. But emergency surgeries happen, so I didn’t get operated on until 6:00 p.m.

I typically don’t do well after having anesthesia. I throw up a lot. I was prepped for a couple of days of hell. I told the anesthetist, and he said, “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.” It was the first time I’d ever gone under, woke up, and didn’t feel like I was hungover.

Still, staying in a hospital overnight isn’t fun. The beds are so uncomfortable. There’s all the beeping and nurses checking on you. I had a port, a tube draining blood from my rib. My trackers said I got 10 minutes’ sleep the entire night; my Oura Ring was not happy with me. When the doctor came in the next day and said I could go home, I was thrilled.

Courtesy of Bradley Rose

Even though I was in a lot of pain, I chose not to take opioids. I didn’t want the risk of dependence or side effects. My thinking was, even if I’m in more pain, I’m just going to ride that out. I did use lidocaine patches to numb the incision area, which worked well—it felt like my whole side was completely numb.

We went back to my parents’ house. My whole family was nothing but fantastic. My mom would cook and clean and all that sort of stuff, my dad walked the dogs, and my wife dealt with changing the bandages and dressings.

Beforehand, the doctor kept saying this was an easy procedure. I expected a little scar and not much bruising. But when Sophia peeled the bandage off the first time, it looked brutal, like a Bengal tiger or a velociraptor got his claw in and ripped all the way around my rib. It was 10 times, 20 times worse than what we imagined it would be.

Two weeks after surgery, I had to fly to America for my green card. I’m British and my wife is American; we are coming back to the US at some point, so while the timing wasn’t ideal, it needed to get done. Being on a plane didn’t feel great, but I had the patches on and was taking high-grade aspirin to reduce the swelling.

We ended up in Washington DC for about a week to process my green card. While we were there, we had a video call set up with my doctor to get the results from the biopsy. It was around noon on February 26. There was so much anxiety, sitting there for the call, thinking, What’s this going to be?

When the doctor said that the tumor was benign, relief doesn’t even begin to describe it. I broke down, I cried, I smiled. It was the first time I could breathe in weeks. A weight lifted off my whole body.

A lot of people had been asking what was wrong and why I had been off the platform, not teaching live classes. “Has something happened? Are you leaving Peloton?” Once I knew it was benign, I wanted to be open about what was going on. I took out my phone and recorded myself on the street telling the story and what was on my mind.

I’m super grateful for the Peloton community. They’ve been nothing but supportive and lovely. When I first came to Peloton, I didn’t want to talk about my stroke. I didn’t want to seem like I couldn’t do the job as well as anyone else. But then I realized I should talk about these things. If someone on the bike is going through the same issues, it can be powerful for them to know they’re not alone.

Life happens—to all of us.

Any awareness we can bring to these topics is a good thing. I’d never heard of sarcoma, but about one in five people get some form of cancer now. Before I had a stroke, I thought no one under 60 years old had a stroke—but an increasing number of younger people are affected. (For me, anyway, there was no connection between my two conditions.) Sharing my story—and hearing other people’s stories—has been extremely positive.

By the time I shared my story, I was still in pain, but I was feeling better. And beforehand, the doctors had recommended 10 days to 14 days off from Peloton after surgery. So when we got home, I returned to work. I was desperate to get back to prove that I was fine, I could do this, and nothing could stop me.

In truth, looking back, I was 100% not ready. I was in pain during workouts. Afterward, my whole bandage would be full of blood.

Thankfully, I had a holiday booked two weeks after my return to teaching, our babymoon in Tenerife. Usually, on holiday, we’re like, ‘We need to climb this mountain, we need to do this skiing adventure.’ We have 10 things planned every day. But for the first time ever, we did nothing. We read books, sat by the pool and the beach, chatted, got food. It was a great little holiday to have with each other.

Those days allowed me to slow down and let the body and mind heal. I finally got the recovery I needed.

Healing is never linear, and everyone is different. There’s strength in listening to your body and respecting rest. I’m one of these whippersnappers who thinks they are invincible and can push through. But I think this time, when I took that second holiday, I was like, ‘You do need to pull back, give yourself grace, and allow for recovery.”

Physically, I’m doing a lot better now, two months after my surgery. But I’ve still got a massive scar on my ribs and a lump that’s now about half the size of a ping-pong ball. The doctor said the mass has been removed, but sometimes it’s difficult to get the swelling to go away. Aesthetically, especially as a fitness instructor, I feel self-conscious. So we’ll give it three to six months, see how it looks, and then decide about any further treatments.

He kept saying, “At least it’s not malignant.” And that’s true. The fact that it’s benign is the greatest thing, I feel beyond lucky.

But what I’ve found right now is I’m allowed to be grateful, but I’m also allowed to be traumatized. This wasn’t a small thing; it’s not like I had a cold for a week. Mentally, it screws you up and makes you wonder if there’s something going on in your body that you don’t know about. With everything else going on for Sophia and me, it was kind of like our whole world was crumbling at a time when we were supposed to be celebrating our miracle baby. We were just trying to keep it together.

That’s why, on a mental level, I try to have compassion first. You don’t know what anyone else is going through, and they don’t know what you’re going through.

When you do have a health problem, early detection can save a life. With surgery, know that it’s traumatic for whoever’s going to have it, even when it goes well. Healing is a time game; don’t rush it. And make sure you have a support system you can talk to so you don’t internalize what you’re going through.

Also, remember: Even in a negative situation, there can be a positive outcome.

Who would have thought that a stroke survivor would be on a bike, teaching at one of the biggest fitness companies in the world? My story right now is not what I expected it to be six or seven years ago, but I rewrote it in a whole different way. I’m grateful to still be here, doing what I love, and will never take my health and life for granted.