In early 2024, I was diagnosed with advanced Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. It began months earlier, during an alumni hockey game in November 2023, when I collapsed behind the bench, unable to breathe—the only moment I could recall before everything faded. Doctors, suspecting a heart condition, ordered a cardiac MRI. The results came with two sides: “good news, and concerning news.” The good news was my heart was actually fine; the concerning news was a mass resting on top of my heart, compressing vital arteries. A PET scan soon revealed those masses were malignant—“hot”—not a harmless growth. A biopsy confirmed it: Nodular Sclerosis Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.
Though Hodgkin’s is highly treatable, which offered hope, the path forward tested me deeply. The ABVD chemotherapy regimen, known for its effectiveness, became one of the hardest trials of my life. I’d faced pain before—broken bones and physical setbacks over the years—but this pushed beyond anything I’d known. After my first treatment, I spent a week hospitalized with febrile neutropenia: no white blood cells left to fight an infection that struck, requiring constant care. As months of treatment unfolded, more challenges followed—blood clots, neuropathy, persistent nausea—each one a weight to carry.
Cancer, as we know, is an insidious, tangled disease. Sharing my diagnosis with my parents, friends, and loved ones was a moment I couldn’t prepare for—no one can. It’s an ordeal no one should endure, and with greater awareness and resources, I hope we can lessen its grip and one day erase it completely. For years, I overlooked clear signs: drenching night sweats starting in 2020, aches I dismissed as ordinary, waves of fatigue I forced myself through. I never imagined these were signals of cancer taking hold.
I was nominated by a dear friend and fellow survivor, Lindsay Yarrow, to join the 2025 Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Canada Visionary Program. My goal is to raise money and awareness, in the hopes of sparing others from this shadow. I want to turn my missed signs into a beacon—proof that early action can change the story. Every dollar we gather fuels research, lights the way for detection, and builds a future where cancer's hold is broken, for good.
Life will inevitably hand each of us our ‘moments’. Some sooner, some later. There is a quote I had found during my journey which offered inspiration, and I believe it can provide the same for anyone who will face a challenge that at first may seem insurmountable - “You’d be amazed what you can endure when you have no choice.”
Steven
www.bloodcancers.ca.
