Claire initially felt a pain in her neck when drinking alcoholic drinks
A young woman who felt a pain in her neck when sipping alcohol with friends was devastated to find out what it meant. Claire Dougherty said she started experiencing pain in her ear and down the left side of her neck in August 2025.
The 22 year old says her neck also felt ‘tense and swollen’, but that the pain would worsen every time she drank alcohol. Claire visited her doctor about the symptoms the same month, which they initially put down to allergies, and prescribed her with allergy medication.
But medical assistant Claire says the pain would come ‘roaring back into her neck’ every time she drank alcohol – and made her neck feel so stiff it felt like she could barely move. Claire, who would drink socially with friends, says she initially thought the pain only happened when she drank vodka.
Yet she later discovered it would return when drinking wine and gin too. After her symptoms continued to worsen, Claire returned to her doctor in September 2025.
Doctors ordered Claire a CT scan, which revealed that she had a tumour wrapped around her windpipe that was slowly suffocating her. Claire had a biopsy taken and, on November 19, 2025, she received the devastating diagnosis of Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of blood cancer.
The NHS lists pain in the neck, armpit or groin when drinking alcohol as a symptom of Hodgkin lymphoma. According to Healthline, the pain is caused by swelling in the lymph nodes or disease-affected tissue as a result of blood vessel dilation after consuming alcohol.
On December 3, 2025, Claire started the first of six rounds of chemotherapy treatment, which she completed earlier this month [February 11], and is now waiting to start radiotherapy treatment. Now, Claire is urging other people who experience similar symptoms to ‘push for testing’.
Claire, from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US, said: “I started having symptoms in the middle of August. It was all of this pain in the base of my neck on the left side and travelling up my neck into my left ear.
“It felt like the most painful spot was my inner ear, I assumed that it was an ear problem that was then causing pain in my neck. I noticed that the front of my neck felt tense and maybe a little swollen and a little painful to touch.
“I just assumed that it was a lymph node, if anything, associated with the ear pain so I wasn’t that concerned about it.”
Claire says she became more concerned about the pain when it would worsen each time she drank alcohol. She visited her doctor with the symptoms in August 2025 and was prescribed allergy meds that didn’t help.
Claire said: “The first day that I really noticed [the pain] I had been drinking wine at dinner. The pain felt really tense and came on suddenly.
“I went to the doctor pretty soon after that because the ear pain wouldn’t go away. I went to visit a friend that weekend and I was taking a bunch of allergy meds and not getting better.
“We went out to dinner and got drinks and I was halfway through a Moscow Mule and all the pain came raging back and my neck got so stiff. My ear hurt so much I couldn’t enjoy the rest of the dinner.
“A couple weeks after that I went out with my dad to dinner, we were at a work event with an open bar and I got a [hard] seltzer. I was halfway into this seltzer and the pain came roaring back into my neck – it was so stiff I felt like I could barely move it and there was a stabbing pain in my ear.”
Initially, Claire thought the pain was caused when she drank vodka but later discovered that it would happen when drinking other types of alcohol too. Claire said: “For a little bit every drink was a vodka drink so I kind of told myself maybe it was something [to do] with vodka.
“[I thought] I had an intolerance to vodka but then eventually I had a gin drink and a wine and they made it hurt too so it didn’t really matter what alcohol it was.”
Claire says the pain would make her ‘nervous’ and ‘worry’ about going out with friends. Claire said: “I was drinking socially if I was going out with friends but it was tough because I had no reason I couldn’t be drinking, but it would make everything so much worse.
“I was very in my head about it and I got nervous every time I would drink because I was worried that it would make it [the pain] bad.”
Claire says she returned to her doctor in September 2025 who felt her neck and noticed a lump and had a CT scan and surgical biopsy in October 2025. After receiving the stage two blood cancer diagnosis on November 19 2025, Claire has since undergone six rounds of chemotherapy treatment and is waiting to start radiotherapy.
Claire said: “Luckily I don’t need surgery. I had to do six rounds of chemo, which I finished on February 11, so I’m coming out of that right now and I’m starting radiation for my neck area. I’m doing 20 sessions of that for four weeks.”
In addition to pain when she drank alcohol, Claire says she’d also been experiencing breathlessness, which she later discovered was due to the tumour crushing her windpipe. Claire said: “The breathlessness had been getting so much worse and then it hit a point where it was really bad because the tumour was wrapped around the trachea [windpipe].
“[After having chemotherapy treatment] I can breathe great now, the tumour is basically gone.”
Claire is now urging other people who experience similar symptoms to push for testing. Claire said: “My advice is to take every test possible. Push for them [doctors] to order as many scans as possible, I know that’s easier said than done.
“I hated going and getting all of the testing done but it’s worth it to know what’s going on in your body and to get that peace of mind.”
WHAT IS HODGKIN LYMPHOMA? (Info from NHS)
- Hodgkin lymphoma is a cancer that affects the white blood cells that help you fight infection.
- The most common symptom of Hodgkin Lymphoma is a painless lump, usually in the neck, armpit or groin.
- Other symptoms include pain in your neck when drinking alcohol, high temperature, night sweats and itchy skin.
- Treatments include chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
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