Doctors Thought i Had Lymphoma. It started After My Tattoos

I love tattoos, But if only i could turn back time!!

I had small tattoos years earlier with no problems at all.

But weeks after completing extensive full body tattooing, my health began to fall apart in a way no doctor could clearly explain.

Strangely, It started in my gut...

Severe bloating that made my abdomen visibly swollen, constant nausea, reflux that never settled, I stopped sleeping properly and I felt poisoned from the inside, like my body was under constant attack...

Blood tests were confusing but never alarming enough to trigger answers. Doctors treated symptoms, not causes. PPIs, antacids, protective stomach meds, gas relief. Nothing changed.

Then the scans started.

My first full abdominal ultrasound showed calcifications in my liver and spleen. At the time I didn't even know what calcifications meant.. and my mind kept going to the worst case scenario... maybe calcifications mean cancer? That alone raised concern. Soon after I was sent for further imaging.

A contrast CT scan followed, and that was the moment everything changed.

The CT revealed enlarged lymph nodes near my stomach and major abdominal vessels. Suddenly, this was no longer being brushed off as gastritis or functional bloating.

Words were mentioned that no one expects to hear, Lymphoma and/or Gastric lymphoma...

I was terrified, I barely slept. Every night I lay there convinced something serious was growing inside me. I couldn’t think straight, my mind was fogged with fear, I remember sitting down at a steak house with my partner, she was talking to me and it was like her voice was on mute, and i was floating, as if I'm there but I'm not, just absorbed with fear that i had made a really big mistake by getting these tattoos.

An urgent endoscopy was ordered and multiple biopsies were taken from my stomach and duodenum. Chronic gastritis was confirmed, H pylori was positive, Gastric lymphoma was ruled out. I completed the H pylori treatment and it was successfully cleared.

But Nothing changed....

The symptoms stayed exactly the same, the bloating, the nausea, the exhaustion, the feeling that something systemic was wrong.

More scans followed. More lymph nodes appeared, some became calcified and eventually surgery became unavoidable.

A large solid lymph node was removed from my axilla (Underarm), inside it was extensive calcification and black pigment, Ink, tattoo pigment.

At this point I knew I screwed up..

Pathology confirmed it was reactive, ruling out cancer (Lymphoma). But it had been active enough to trigger months of investigation, fear, and a very real cancer scare.

What followed over the next years was relentless.

Chronic gastric inflammation, vagal style episodes where I would wake as I drifted off with dizziness, nausea, cold sweats, a racing heart, and an overwhelming need to vomit or rush to the bathroom. My body felt stuck in fight or flight for years, never ending, yet no real diagnosis or answer.

I lived on medication daily just to function.

No one could give me a unifying explanation.

Earlier this year, I was hospitalized with acute bronchitis. During that admission, I was given systemic steroids for the inflammation in my lungs due to the virus.

Within days, something unexpected happened.

Symptoms I had lived with for years changed overnight. Nighttime gastric attacks stopped, the bloating reduced, medications I relied on daily were suddenly not needed in the same way.

I haven’t seen a specialist yet, I’m not claiming a diagnosis, I’m not claiming a cure.

But something clearly changed...How bizarre! Who would have thought that having tattoos could potentially lead to years of gastric symptoms...

This is only the beginning. I’m now documenting the full medical timeline, imaging, pathology, and hospital treatment as it unfolds.

I’m sharing this because there is very little public discussion about delayed systemic immune reactions following extensive tattooing, especially involving the lymphatic and gastrointestinal systems.

All scans, reports, and pathology are real.

If you want to follow the full documented timeline with original medical reports and ongoing updates, I’m writing everything in detail on my Substack.

https://substack.com/@kadirkuman