On April 9, 19-year-old Lauren Rhodes received her dose of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.

She posed for a picture, grinning widely and proudly showing off the band-aid on her arm.

"I was like, 'One and done,'" she said.

The Gretna, Nebraska, teenager went home that night and felt all the common, mild post-vaccine side effects.

"Fatigue and exhaustion," said Rhodes. "And then it just kind of got worse and worse."

She said she felt sick for weeks and the whole time, she and her family thought it was from the vaccine.

"We just figured this is a reaction," said Liz Rhodes, Lauren's mother.

Then other symptoms arose. Her legs buckled and her face drooped. She started showing symptoms that didn't match up with other peoples' vaccine reactions.

"If you asked me to squeeze your hand, I couldn't even squeeze it. Pick up my phone, I couldn't do it," said Rhodes.

She visited Dr. Carmella Imig at the CHI Health Gretna Clinic. Imig told the family to go to the hospital, where an MRI highlighted a tumor pressing on Rhodes' spinal cord.

"They said, 'This can't wait. We have to get this out now,'" Rhodes said.

On May 7, Rhodes was admitted to the hospital for surgery.

"[The tumor] was in the part of the cervical spine where if something would not have been done, she could have lost all function of her arms and legs," Imig said.

Rhodes spent the next two months undergoing physical, occupational and speech therapy.

She just completed therapy and is ready to be a normal college student again.

"I'm cleared for everything now," said Rhodes. "I can drive, I can bend, sit up, scoot, walk upstairs."

"We feel like we got our daughter back," said Rod Rhodes, her father.

Imig is thankful Rhodes got her vaccine, showed some symptoms and stopped by her office to get it checked out.

"It was actually a blessing that she did," Imig said. "Because it led her to the care that she needed."

Imig said the symptoms of Rhodes' tumor coincidentally followed her COVID-19 vaccine side effects. She said the two are not related at all.

Rhodes doesn't regret getting her shot and she encourages others to get it as well.

"Do it. I did it for myself, my family, my school. Protection," she said. "Even if it did cause a side effect, it made me aware of [the tumor] and we got it taken care of."