Lymphoma Patient Stories

My cancer journey started one day in the summer of 2022 when I discovered what felt like a pimple on the back of my neck. The next day, the “pimple” had vanished, but two weeks later it was back, and this time it didn’t go away. Over just a few days, it grew so rapidly that I finally went to a local hospital to get it checked out.

After two months of testing, the doctors still couldn’t give me a definitive answer. Meanwhile, the welt on my neck had grown to the point where I couldn’t even turn my head to the right. That’s when I decided to go to Fox Chase Cancer Center.

I started out 2021 as an active, healthy 26-year-old transgender man. I was an avid hiker. I was engaged, and I was on my way to a promotion at my job. But by early 2022, I was also a cancer survivor living with HIV.

I feel supported by Fox Chase; they are family.

I am 78 years old and have owned horses for 68 of those years. I am a cowboy through and through. My father gave me my first pony when I was just five years old and my first horse when I was 10. I have had hundreds of horses since.

At 31, Tierra Ryan was a young professional woman, working as a pharmacist and a medical writer for a large pharmaceutical company, when she was shocked to learn she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma. Fox Chase Cancer Center was one of two hospitals her doctor recommended. Tierra underwent chemotherapy and radiation therapy at Fox Chase, and in November 2014 was placed on surveillance because her cancer was in remission. Today, she still works in the pharmaceutical industry, but as a medical science liaison focusing on oncology. "I’m truly thankful to the doctors and staff at Fox Chase because they saved my life," Tierra said. "Because of them, I have a long life ahead of me."