McKenzy Hupke, who was 23 years old at the time, was given a diagnosis of Stage 4 squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck in March of 2015.

She was not expected to live long enough to graduate from college, but in May of 2022, she walked across the stage at Wagner College’s commencement ceremony to get her diploma. Her doctors had not expected her to live that long.

Hupke added, “I had been through a lot to get to graduation, and if it weren’t for the really urgent brain surgery I had in March, I probably would not have made it to this May graduation.” The surgery that Hupke underwent in March was performed because of an emergency.

The Expedition That Would Last Seven Years..

Prior to the formal diagnosis in 2015, her doctors initially believed the tumors to be benign. As a result, Hupke performed approximately ten procedures in her nose and ears to remove the tumors they believed to be benign. In 2015, the official diagnosis was made.

After doing a lung biopsy and a number of additional tests, it was found that the nodules contained cancerous cells.

Shortly after receiving her cancer diagnosis, Hupke started receiving chemotherapy at Memorial Sloan Kettering in addition to a variety of other anti-cancer treatments.

“In 2015, we started chemotherapy, and then in 2016, we started radiation therapy. Since then, we have continued chemotherapy, and we have had some surgery. Then I started immunotherapy, and in 2017, after immunotherapy and radiotherapy, they assumed I was in remission for a while,” Hupke recalled. “Then I had to start all over again.”

When Hupke received the news that she had cancer, she was a sophomore in high school at the time. She was still receiving therapy as she started her freshman year of college; however, it was considerably less strenuous than it had been in the past because it was believed that her cancer was in remission.

Hupke’s relapse was discovered in 2019, during the beginning of her junior year of college, while she was undergoing surgery.

When Hupke first went in for brain surgery in the spring of 2021, the cancer had already advanced to a more advanced stage. She had lost the bulk of her hearing abilities as a direct result of the tumors that had formed in her ears.

Hupke explained, “I’m a singer, so that was incredibly upsetting, and the main difficulty with my health was my hearing loss…by the year 2021, I wasn’t able to listen to music the same way, I wasn’t able to hear conversations the same way, and I had to continuously use an app to gain subtitles.”

Hupke started a new form of chemotherapy following the original brain surgery that she underwent to treat her cancer, but a few months later, the tumors returned far more quickly than anyone had imagined they would. She was readmitted to the hospital in August of 2021, and while she was there, her surgeon and the other doctors recommended that she begin receiving hospice care.

Hupke said, “I was unwilling to do so,” as his explanation.

Hupke had placed graduating from college at the top of her list of goals to accomplish in her lifetime, and she meant to do everything in her ability to make that dream a reality. In light of the fact that she was unable to receive hospice care, she resumed the radiation treatment known as a Quad-Shot.

This past spring, after Hupke had received extra radiation and chemotherapy, she underwent her second brain surgery. Following this procedure, she recovered from it more quickly than anyone could have predicted.

Since then, she has been undergoing various therapies consistently over the course of the past four months.

The Significance of Music and Caring for Others

When Hupke was first diagnosed with her condition when she was sixteen years old, she was a student at a high school for the performing arts, where she was actively involved in the theater department and studied singing.

Since the day she was told she had cancer, Hupke has turned to her love of music as a way to channel her creativity and express herself.

“As she entered my room, she informed me that she had received a phone call alerting her that the tumor is verified to be malignant. She said that the phone call came as she was entering my room. This was an answer to an issue that we had been debating for some time, thus it was acceptable to me as a solution to the problem.

“As soon as my mother exited the room, I snatched my guitar out of its case and started strumming and singing,” Hupke explained.

Hupke would periodically make her way into the music area of the hospital when she was undergoing chemotherapy treatments so that she could sing and play the piano.

Both Hupke and her mother made the trip from their home in New Jersey to the hospital in New York City on multiple occasions on a weekly basis.

They were in the car for a considerable amount of time, and during that time they sung along to music by artists such as Kelly Clarkson and Alanis Morissette, among others.

In addition, Hupke is working with The Frances Foundation, which is an organization that helps children who are battling cancer and provides support for those who care for them.

Hupke has been performing at Galas and other events sponsored by The Frances Foundation ever since the first year of her diagnosis. As a result, her relationships with the members of the foundation have been stronger as a result.

Hupke had lost the majority of her hearing and was unable to communicate herself through music when The Frances Foundation honored her as the 2021 Warrior of the Year. This honor came at a time when Hupke was at her lowest point.

“Getting to this event and receiving Warrior of the Year meant so much to me, and to be at an event like this, I felt like I wasn’t giving as much as I normally could, but I felt incredibly honored,” Hupke said. “I felt like I wasn’t giving as much as I normally could, but I felt incredibly honored.”

The Conflict Is Still Going On

When Hupke was getting ready to graduate from high school, she was in such good health that her doctors gave her permission to skip her appointments and treatments for a couple of weeks. Instead, she was able to visit New York City and spend time with her relatives and friends there. Additionally, she went to the city.

Hupke is still unsure of many elements of her health, but she is excited to find out where her next adventure will take her. Although she continues to take each day as it comes, she admits that she is still perplexed about many areas of her health.