I’m currently a survivor of Burkitt lymphoma (BL), as I’m in remission as of August 2025. I’m 48 years old and was very healthy, hardly ever getting a common cold. No surgeries, no broken bones, and never went to the doctor for anything my entire life! When I was a year old, my father died in 1978 from BL, so to find out that I had the very same cancer my father died from was quite scary to hear. My story began in January 2025 when my daughter got me sick with a simple cold, and if it had not been for that, then I probably wouldn’t be here today to share my story! Come February 2025, I started having trouble swallowing food. I thought maybe it was a hiatal hernia, possibly. The pain started coming soon after. To describe the pain, it was almost like getting hit in the stomach region by a truck, but it was constant, non-stop pain! Pain I had never felt in my life, but I knew something was seriously wrong. After about three days of ZERO sleep, I went to urgent care. They did several different types of scans but found nothing. I went home, and two more days passed, and my wife made me go to the ER, and that’s when they found it. The ER doctor told me that I needed to see an oncologist ASAP. She said my lymph nodes were severely swollen and that it was urgent. So, I scheduled with my PC, but my appointment wasn’t until the following week on a Wednesday. I never made it to that appointment because the pain was getting worse, and I couldn’t take it anymore. I ended up at another ER, where they admitted me within minutes, and not long after, their general oncologist came in and told me I had BL and said I had less than 20% chance of making it. I spent five days in that hospital, but they couldn’t get my pain under control, so I requested to be transferred to Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Florida. Moffitt is a blessing, and they first and foremost got my pain under control and told me I could beat this cancer, to believe and to have faith. They saved my life on two different occasions. I spent 33 days inpatient at Moffitt and spent seven to eight days in the ICU. I had dialysis, several blood transfusions, fluoroscopy-guided lumbar punctures (8-10x), six rounds of chemo followed by immunotherapy treatments and growth factor shots, all spanning from March 2025 to July 2025 with PET scans throughout. My August 2025 and December 10 PET scans were both all free and clear! Moffitt ultimately gave me my life back with my wife and 8-year-old daughter, friends, and family! This journey has been very humbling, and to anyone going through this, just know that you can get through this, and your life matters. Of course, I had my good days and bad days, but any bad day is better than the alternative. God bless my wife and daughter, who went through this with me. If it wasn’t for them, I’m not sure where I’d be today. One of my best friends stood by my side through this as well, and God bless him as well! I love you all!
Hugh
Burkitt lymphoma (BL)
