Teen Receives Cancer Diagnosis After Noticing Strange Symptom When She Drank Alcohol 

Hanna Bordage never imagined that persistent neck pain could signal something as serious as cancer.

After finishing high school, she moved to New Brunswick, Canada, to attend university and play varsity soccer. Despite embarking on an exciting new chapter, the 19-year-old felt constantly fatigued and noticed she wasn’t performing at her usual level. At first, she chalked it up to the many changes in her life.

Over time, Bordage began experiencing chronic neck pain without any clear explanation. As a pre-med student aspiring to become a doctor, she took biology classes, hoping they might help her understand what was happening.

“I remember thinking, ‘I wish I could figure out what’s wrong with me, what’s wrong with my neck,'” she tells PEOPLE. “The one symptom that was odd, that couldn’t be explained, was the one where I have neck pains when I drink.”

“I would have a drink of alcohol, and within five to 10 minutes, I would have aching pains in my shoulder, my neck,” she adds. In her province, the legal age to purchase and consume alcohol is 19.

Along with the neck pain, Bordage experienced night sweats, which she initially attributed to the warmth of her dorm room compared to her childhood home.

It wasn’t until she was hit in the head during soccer practice that she saw a doctor. While being checked for a concussion, doctors discovered something far more serious.

During a full-body scan, her doctor noticed a heart murmur and ordered an echocardiogram (ECHO) and an electrocardiogram (EKG). Bordage also requested an MRI to be thorough.

After the tests, she returned to the hospital the next day to hear the diagnosis: a 12-centimeter tumor near her heart. Initially, her doctors suspected blood cancer.

“It took days and weeks, and then when I finally got biopsied, that’s when they saw it was a late stage of Hodgkin Lymphoma. They told me, ‘You’re going to need to do chemotherapy. You’re going to need to do 12 rounds, and if that does not work, you’re going to need radiation,'” she recalls.

According to the American Cancer Society, common symptoms of Hodgkin Lymphoma include swollen lymph nodes that can cause pain when drinking, fever, night sweats, and fatigue.

Bordage credits her family, friends, and soccer team for being an unwavering support system.

“Throughout my life, and especially into my teens, into being 20 at the time, I was shown friendship. I was shown empathy. I was shown how to react to circumstances that you didn’t want to happen,” she shares.

She documented her journey on social media, sharing how her life changed through treatment and offering guidance to other teens facing similar challenges.

Now 22, Bordage says she often hears from strangers battling cancer who reach out for advice and support.

“I didn’t wait too long for posting. I posted the video saying, ‘Hey guys, I have cancer’ at the end of January, and I got diagnosed at the end of December,” she says. “I wanted to speak to as many people as possible because I had a new perspective and wanted to share it.”

“I could die or I could live. I wanted to show people that you can go through things that completely terrify you, that shake you to your core and change you forever, and you can continue to be the positive, optimistic version of yourself,” she adds.

After six months of chemotherapy, Bordage rang the bell on June 29, 2023, and she recently celebrated her two-year “cancerversary.”

With a renewed sense of purpose, Bordage still plans to pursue a career in medicine, focusing on researching the type of cancer she experienced. She also aims to become a patient advocate, having navigated her own treatments firsthand.

“I was diagnosed on Dec. 16, 2022, and I had my symptoms for a year before I was diagnosed,” she says. “It put into perspective for me how many people feel alone when they can’t find answers to their problems, and how I was so privileged in the way that I had access to all these doctors, I was still not finding the answers.”

“Now, as a research assistant at my university, I conduct cancer research on the specific type of cancer I had, and that work is very important to me,” she adds.

Bordage continues her studies and hopes to attend medical school, determined to provide the care and treatment to others that she herself received.