For as long as 17-year-old Leah can remember, music has been at the very center of her world.

She has played the piano since she was 4, and at 12, she fell in love with the bassoon. Much of her childhood has unfolded to a soundtrack of her own making — one filled with bright notes and warm melodies.

“Music has always been a positive, driving force in my life,” Leah says.

From piano recitals to performing in the high school band, Leah has always looked to music for self-expression, for connection and for peace.

But this young musician and her family will never forget the fateful day in 2025 — when all of the music stopped.

Diagnosis

It had been a challenging spring.

Leah tried to remain focused on her music and her schoolwork during her sophomore year, but she had not been feeling well. She struggled with a constellation of symptoms, including hair loss, low-grade fevers and intense migraines. Night sweats would leave her drenched and shivering. At times, she felt like she couldn’t get a full breath.

The most unrelenting symptom had been a debilitating cough that racked her body and hampered her ability to perform at her best musically.

Her parents went from puzzled to alarmed as they looked for answers that didn’t readily come.

“We weren’t sure what was going on with her, but we consistently took her to the doctor,” says her mom, Saralynne.

One day, over the summer break, right before a family trip to Orlando to celebrate her mom’s birthday and brother Isaac’s departure for college, Leah’s cough prompted a last-minute visit to the doctor.

A chest X-ray proved troubling. More scans were in order, but Leah had been so looking forward to the family vacation. They determined they would follow up medically as soon as they returned.

The family spent one fantastic day at a favorite theme park — the best day ever. But that night, Leah got a fever.

The family canceled the rest of their trip and came home. Early the next morning, under the advice of her pediatrician, her parents took Leah to the Emergency Department at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida.

Doctors listened intently to her story, and comforting clinical staff guided Leah through blood tests and scans.

She waited anxiously inside an exam room when her parents were asked to step away for a private consultation with the doctor. They had not even made it down the hallway when Leah’s dad, Jared, received a text from his daughter.

I have cancer, don’t I?

Indeed, she did.

Hodgkin Lymphoma

Tests indicated Leah had Hodgkin lymphoma — a type of cancer that starts in the lymphatic system and can spread to other parts of the body. A doctor showed Leah’s parents a picture of a large growth in the center of Leah’s chest.

“It was right above her heart, growing around the arteries and veins coming in and out of the top of the heart and also pushing against her windpipe,” Jared says.

Leah’s parents and care providers would soon return to her to break the news and discuss next steps.

“I was a little shell-shocked,” Leah says. “But it was also weirdly relieving, because I was thinking, ‘all right, we finally have a diagnosis. Now we can move forward.”

Leah was admitted to the hospital, where she would begin the next critical chapter of her journey. She had come to the right place. Johns Hopkins All Children’s has been ranked the #1 pediatric hospital in Florida four years in a row, tying for this year’s top spot in the U.S. News & World Report ranking. The Cancer & Blood Disorders Institute has decades of experience treating children with cancer.

She quickly learned that she had a full symphony of clinical experts and caring staff who were all pulling for her recovery.

Her primary oncologist, Brian Guedes, M.D., took his time with Leah and her family, and helped them to understand even the most difficult news about her diagnosis. And there was difficult news …

Results from a core biopsy and a PET scan confirmed that Leah had stage 4 Hodgkin lymphoma, the highest stage a child can have.

“Leah had significant disease burden, with lots of enlarged lymph nodes inside her chest, and in the middle, near her airway and heart,” Guedes says. “She also had enlarged lymph nodes in her abdomen, and disease in her spleen and bone marrow.”

Treatment

Despite the severity of Leah’s illness, there was reason for hope. With the benefit of clinical trial data and proven protocols, Hodgkin lymphoma is considered highly treatable and curable.

Normally, the T cells in the body perform a kind of surveillance. They offer protection by attacking “foreign” cancer cells. But with lymphoma cells, that’s not what happens.

“The lymphoma cells have a protein which allows them to do a little ‘handshake’ with the T-cells of the body,” Guedes says, “to tell them, ‘We are meant to be here. Nothing to see. You can move right along.’”

But a newer immunotherapy agent called nivolumab works to block the “handshake” which allows the cancer cells to hide and proliferate, giving the immune system the chance to destroy the abnormal cells as it is supposed to do.

Leah’s treatment plan would include nivolumab, along with three other chemotherapy agents administered by IV infusion every other week for six months.

The realization that she would lose her hair proved emotional for Leah, as she loved her long hair and felt it was part of her.

“Of all the things that could make me cry, the hair loss made me cry more than anything,” Leah says.

Guedes worked to lift Leah’s spirits, sharing laughs with her, even teasing her about the difficult Latin course she was taking that she was not fond of.

“I would describe Dr. Guedes as ‘chill,’” Leah says. “He always laughed at my jokes, which I appreciated.”

Leah spent 11 days in the hospital, and during that stay, she received her first treatment. Even with a bout of pneumonia toward the end of her stay, Leah was discharged feeling better than she had in a very long time. The cough that had plagued her was finally gone.

Leah would return to the Infusion Center every other week for her treatments. After her fourth treatment, she received some amazing news. Her body was responding well to the chemotherapy. She had reached remission. But she still needed to complete the full course of chemotherapy to ensure the cancer was gone.

Hitting A Wall

Chemotherapy can be a challenging journey, because even as it successfully kills cancer cells, it also takes a toll on the body. The fatigue, nausea and vomiting that sometimes come with the treatments can test even the strongest will.

Halfway through her treatments, Leah says she ‘hit a wall.’ She would struggle with nausea, even to the point of anticipating it before each treatment. There were days it felt like too much to bear.

With the help of medications and extra support from family and clinical staff, she powered through the hardest times.

Here’s where her music proved most cathartic. At the piano, Leah would lose herself in the emotional depth of Frédéric Chopin, or another favorite composer of the Romantic era.

In her darkest moments, she might listen to Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff’s haunting symphonic poem, Isle of the Dead.

“It’s beautiful and devastating,” Leah says. “That was the attraction to it.”

On a bright January day, with family, friends, and staff gathered to cheer for her, Leah rang the ceremonial bell symbolizing the end of her treatment and the beginning of the rest of her life.

"We are endlessly proud of Leah and inspired by her," Saralynne says.

A colorful poster had been signed by staff and filled with messages of encouragement, including one in Latin from Guedes, which read: “Veni, vidi, vici,” a quote from Julius Caesar meaning “I came, I saw, I conquered.”

“The care at Johns Hopkins All Children’s was spectacular,” Leah says. “The staff were so nice, so patient. It might be crazy to say it like this, but they made me feel like I mattered a lot. Getting treated here was the right decision.”

Leah Today

Today, Leah is cancer-free.

She is relishing every moment of her senior year, making college plans, and making time for friends.

She is also making music … lots of music.

“I feel very free,” Leah says. “And healthier than I’ve ever felt.”