For months, Phoebe Jablonski kept trying to explain away the pain.
Aged 21 and a dancer, she was used to aches – the kind that come from long days in rehearsal, from pushing her body past what felt comfortable and calling it discipline.
So when her shoulder began to throb, it felt logical to blame dance, or sport, or some minor injury that would eventually settle.
She carried on.
Even as the pain deepened and began to settle into her daily life, there was always a reasonable explanation to reach for. A strain. A tear. Something mechanical and fixable.
‘We were trying to determine what kind of sports injury it was – perhaps a torn rotator cuff or frozen shoulder,’ she said.
By the time she was sent for a scan, the working assumption was still the same: that this was an injury, not an illness.
What came back was something else entirely.
Aged 21, Phoebe Jablonski was used to aches – the kind that come from long days in rehearsal, from pushing her body past what felt comfortable and calling it discipline
By the time she was sent for a scan, the working assumption was still the same: that this was an injury, not an illness. What came back was something else entirely
‘But after the scan, the doctor called and told me there was a 13.5cm tumour on my scapular.
‘I was in a lot of shock and absolutely terrified.’
The diagnosis that followed would turn that fear into something far more concrete.
Phoebe had stage 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma – a cancer of the blood and lymphatic system that typically affects older adults, not otherwise healthy women in their early twenties.
In the UK, around 13,000 people are diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma each year; in the US, close to 80,000 new cases are expected annually.
The risk rises sharply with age, with most patients diagnosed later in life – making cases like Phoebe’s, occurring at such a young age, uncommon.
Yet her symptoms had been building for months.
Before that phone call, she had spent nine months living with warning signs that never quite joined up.
The shoulder pain was the most obvious – persistent, worsening, impossible to ignore. But there were others that, in hindsight, felt harder to dismiss.
One, in particular, made little sense at the time.
In TikTok post viewed more than 1.5 million times, Phoebe revealed that even a single alcoholic drink would leave her in agony.
‘I would feel pain and aching across my whole body from the first drink.
‘This lasted for several months before the diagnosis.
‘I haven’t drank in nearly three years.’
Pain triggered by alcohol is more commonly linked to Hodgkin lymphoma – a different but related blood cancer that tends to affect younger adults – but lymphoma specialists say symptoms can vary widely depending on where the disease is in the body and how it behaves.
Non-Hodgkin lymphoma itself is not a single disease but a group of cancers that begin in white blood cells called lymphocytes, which are part of the immune system.
In the UK, around 13,000 people are diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma each year; in the US, close to 80,000 new cases are expected annually. Pictured: Phoebe shaving her head during treatment
Some forms grow slowly, others aggressively. Typical symptoms include swollen lymph nodes, night sweats, unexplained weight loss and fatigue – but the disease can also present in far less predictable ways, particularly when it affects bone or nearby tissue.
In Phoebe’s case, it was growing silently until it could no longer be mistaken for anything else.
Despite the devastating news, she still went to work that same day.
‘I identified as a young and healthy girl – when I wasn’t anymore,’ she said.
But as the tumour continued to cause pain and restrict her movement, the reality became impossible to ignore. She was eventually forced to stop working altogether.
Phoebe was formally diagnosed in November 2023 and began treatment soon after. What followed was six rounds of chemo-immunotherapy – an intensive combination of drugs designed to kill cancer cells and help the immune system target them.
‘It was six rounds of chemo immunotherapy which successfully worked but there were lots of common chemo side effects,’ she said.
‘You have to have scans, biopsies and I was able to do fertility preservation.’
The toll was severe. She suffered nausea, bone pain, mouth sores, extreme fatigue and hair loss, leaving her quality of life ‘very low’.
‘I felt very isolated and alone, and in disbelief for a long time,’ she said.
‘It was truly my family and friends that held me together until the end.’
Treatment for non-Hodgkin lymphoma varies depending on the subtype and stage, but commonly includes chemotherapy combined with immunotherapy drugs such as monoclonal antibodies.
Some patients also require radiotherapy, while others may go on to have stem cell transplants if the disease returns or does not respond.
Outcomes, too, can vary widely. In England, around 65 per cent of patients survive five years or more, though survival is significantly higher in younger people and those diagnosed earlier.
In the US, five-year survival ranges from roughly 74 per cent when the disease is caught early to around 58 per cent once it has spread.
Looking back, Phoebe believes there were missed opportunities to catch her cancer sooner – moments where symptoms were investigated but not fully followed through.
One of the most alarming involved lumps that appeared on her forehead.
Phoebe was told they were sebaceous cysts – benign, common, and nothing to worry about. But she was not convinced.
With a family history of cysts, she felt these were different.
She later discovered they were cancerous and had even appeared on her PET scan.
‘Because they were scanned, I didn’t think they could be so serious,’ she said.
‘But if I had followed it up further, I could have been diagnosed at stage one, two or three, rather than four.’
The sense of being dismissed has stayed with her.
‘I’ve felt dismissed as a young person, a woman or a cancer patient,’ she said.
‘I feel at times I was discharged prematurely – and maybe if that was not the case, it may have been caught earlier.
‘It definitely gave me a false sense of security, feeling like I had been checked by the hospital so many times.
‘However, the cancer would have been very advanced already during that time and yet it went undetected each time.’
Despite that, her story has become something more than just a warning.
‘In the time I’ve been sharing my story, I’ve had plenty of people share that they’ve decided to get checked, take their symptoms more seriously or are encouraging someone they know.’
Phoebe was declared cancer-free after just eight months of treatment and has been in remission since the end of February 2024.
Her recovery, she says, has been long – her overall journey spanning three years – but it has also reshaped how she sees her body forever.
