Groom's 'Horrendous Migraine' Turns Out to Be Tumor That 'Popped' on Wedding Day

Mar. 15, 2025

Nathan Vaughan thought he had a bad headache on his wedding day, but it turned out to be a tumor.Photo:craighowkinsphotography/Kennedy News; Kennedy News and Media

craighowkinsphotography/Kennedy News; Kennedy News and Media

A 30-year-old man missed his wedding reception after a “horrendous migraine” turned out to be a hemorrhagingbrain tumor.

Nathan Vaughan, 30, woke up on the morning of his May 4 wedding with a “cracking headache,” he told Kennedy News and Media viaThe Daily Mail,but wrote it off as wedding-day jitters.

“I took pain killers, migraine tablets and assumed it was wedding day nerves, feeling the pressure a little bit,” Vaughan said. But the pain “progressively got worse during the day.”

Vaughan, a police officer, managed to meet up with his fiancée Katie Glass, 26, at St. Thomas Church, in the eastern English village of Holywell, Cambridgeshire, for the ceremony — but couldn’t make it through the rest of the celebration.

Nathan and Katie Vaughan on their wedding day.craighowkinsphotography/Kennedy News

craighowkinsphotography/Kennedy News

“I put all my effort into being present for the ceremony. We got through the ceremony and we had some photos,” he said.

But his pain became so severe, Vaughan tells the outlet, that he had to leave the reception and go to their hotel to rest.

“I felt absolutely awful. It was the worst headache of my life, just constant pain in the top of my head,” Vaughan said. “I ended up just going to the hotel room and essentially just passing out for the evening. I was thinking I’m never going to live this down.”

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But when the pain persisted for two days, the newlyweds sought medical care.

“At first, they thought it might bemeningitis,' Vaughan said. “They did a CT scan and said I had swelling on my pituitary gland. I thought it was just swelling and that they’d give me something to bring it down and off I’d go.”

Katie and Nathan Vaughan.Kennedy News and Media

Kennedy News and Media

Instead, he was told he had a “hugepituitary gland tumor” — located at the base of the brain — that had “popped.”

“It hemorrhaged in the morning [of my wedding] so I was bleeding in my brain,” Vaughan said, adding that he underwent a four-hour operation to remove thetumor.

“They told me I’d probably had it my whole life,” he said. “On the day of the wedding, of all days, it decided to pop.”

The couple shared that they’re planning a wedding reception do-over on their one-year anniversary, but as Vaughan quipped, “I don’t think Katie realized how soon after saying ‘in sickness and in health’ that she’d be looking after me. It’s a long recovery process."

source: people.com