WHEN Poppy Beguely noticed her severe hangovers were far from normal, she thought nothing much of it.
The teenager’s symptoms started in April 2022, when she was only 19 and she just put it down to enjoying boozy nights out with friends.
Poppy Beguely with her partner in April 2022, when she started having severe hangoversJam Press/Poppy Beguely
She was diagnosed with cancer when doctors connected the dots and had chemotherapyJam Press/Poppy Beguely
She would often vomit, develop a sore inside her nose and a facial rash.
But she did become more concerned when she started coughing up blood.
Poppy, from Auckland, New Zealand, said: “If I went out drinking, it would take me two drinks to feel a lot more drunk than most people my age and maybe three to four drinks before I would start feeling very ill.
“Nearly every night I would go out it would end in me vomiting the same night or the morning following.
“I also noticed a trend with coughing up blood in the mornings after drinking and the rash on my face would flare up and get worse.”
Poppy, who works as a florist and swimming instructor, was hospitalised three times between June and October 2022 after nights out, and claims doctors believed she may have deep vein thrombosis.
She was given blood thinners and medics allegedly dismissed her concerns that something more sinister was at play.
But it wasn’t until December 2022 that alarm bells were raised when she visited a doctor with a sore neck – and she opened up about all of the symptoms she had been experiencing.
To her horror, a biopsy of a lump on her neck and a PET scan found she had stage-three Hodgkin’s lymphoma – cancer of the lymphatic system, which is part of the immune system – and a six-centimetre tumour in her chest.
The symptoms include heavy sweating a night, a high temperature, losing weight and a cough or shortness of breath.
Two warning signs tend to occur after drinking alcohol – itching of the skin and tummy pain or vomiting, according to Cancer Research UK.
It’s most commonly found in young adults and people over the age of 75.
Poppy said of her diagnosis: “It was very bittersweet – I had spent so long worrying about what was wrong with me and having this dread that something might have been seriously wrong, and no one was going to find out what it was.
“Part of me was happy that I didn’t have to worry about what exactly was wrong anymore.
“But then the other part of me was obviously quite upset that I was going to have to go through chemotherapy and lose my hair, eyelashes and eyebrows.
“I had been a model for a few years so the thought of that was really hard to get my head around, but at the end of the day you win some and you lose some.”
I think the worst part of having cancer and coming out the other end of it is realising that while your life got put on hold, the world and everyone around you keeps going
Poppy
Poppy started chemotherapy in February 2023 shortly after her 20th birthday, which lasted for four months.
She said: “The doctors were reassuring that it was unlikely to be fatal as long as I didn’t get any bad infections while doing chemo – they have a high remission rate for Hodgkin’s lymphoma, [so] thankfully I got the lesser of all evils.”
She said: “One of those months I spent in hospital as an impatient because I had a very severe and rare reaction to a blood transfusion, which gave me the worst pain I’ve ever experienced in my life – in my bones.
“I was on so many painkillers that it totally screwed up my stomach and bowels and in turn my weight dropped down to 35kgs (5st 5lbs) and left me stuck on a feeding tube.
“[This was] the only time I was really scared for my life.”
Luckily, the young woman was able to get through chemotherapy and is now in remission.
She has also been able to return to work, having had to focus on treatment for much of the year.
Poppy said: “I think the worst part of having cancer and coming out the other end of it is realising that while your life got put on hold, the world and everyone around you keeps going.
“For a while, you feel like you’ve taken so many steps back that it’s hard to get back to normality.
“Ultimately it has given me a different outlook on life.
“I remember when I was an inpatient and I wasn’t allowed outside for weeks because my immune system was too compromised.
“When I did get to go outside, and the sun was on my face, I just started crying, and I couldn’t stop.
“I took the smallest things for granted before the smallest things were out of reach.
“I’m grateful that I won my life back, especially after a year of not knowing [what was wrong].”
The teenager was experiencing vomiting after nights out and says she would get ill when drinking after around four drinksJam Press/Poppy Beguely
Jam Press/Poppy BeguelyThe rash that would appear after Poppy drank[/caption]
Jam Press/Poppy BeguelyPoppy is now in remission and says she has a different outlook on life[/caption]
Jam Press/Poppy BeguelyThe 20-year-old said she couldn’t stop crying when she felt sunshine on her face for the first time in weeks[/caption]