Jake Luppen is 31 years old, he’s the frontman of Hippo Campus, and in three weeks he’s going under the knife for six hours of open brain surgery. And honestly? The fact that he’s been walking around with a brain tumor for seven years without knowing it was actively trying to kill him is the kind of thing that makes you want to throw your phone across the room.

Luppen dropped the news on Instagram yesterday – October 14th, if you’re keeping track – with a CT scan of his brain and a message that somehow managed to be both terrifying and weirdly calm. The surgery’s scheduled for November 6th. Six hours. Open brain surgery. I mean, let that sink in for a second.

The Migraine That Wasn’t Just a Migraine

Here’s where this gets wild. Seven years ago, Luppen started getting these brutal migraine headaches. Bad enough that he went in for an MRI, which – and I cannot stress this enough – most people don’t do for headaches. They just pop some Excedrin and complain about it. But he got the scan, and doctors found a 9mm lesion sitting right near his basal ganglia. That’s the part of your brain that controls motor functions and cognition. You know, just the stuff that makes you able to move and think.

And then… apparently nothing? Or at least nothing urgent enough to warrant immediate action. Which, look, I’m not a doctor, but the idea of walking around for seven years knowing there’s a thing in your brain and just sort of monitoring it feels absolutely insane to me. Though I guess that’s what “routine scans” are for.

When Panic Attacks Aren’t Actually Panic Attacks

This summer – so just a few months ago – one of those routine scans showed possible growth. Growth. In a brain lesion. Those are not words you want to hear in the same sentence. But here’s the kicker: they did an EEG test, and it turns out those “panic symptoms” Luppen had been experiencing? Not panic attacks. Focal seizures.

Focal seizures. His brain was literally misfiring, and he thought he was just anxious. I mean, how many people right now are walking around thinking they’ve got anxiety when actually something’s going haywire in their skull? That thought alone is enough to make you paranoid about every weird feeling you’ve ever had.

What’s Actually Happening Here?

So November 6th, Luppen’s going in for what he’s calling “open brain surgery.” Six hours of it. The surgical team – which he says is top-notch, and I really hope that’s true and not just the kind of thing you say when you’re terrified – will presumably be removing or reducing this lesion that’s been growing near one of the most critical parts of his brain.

And look, Luppen himself acknowledges this carries “some scary risks.” Which is probably the understatement of the year. We’re talking about brain surgery. The risks aren’t just scary, they’re the kind of thing that keeps you up at night even thinking about. Cognitive changes. Motor function loss. Complications. The usual nightmare fuel that comes with someone poking around in your brain for six hours straight.

“While a medical procedure of this nature carries some scary risks, my family and I couldn’t ask for a better surgical team to perform this surgery.”

The Band, The Timing, Everything

Hippo Campus has been around since 2013 – they’re not exactly household names, but they’ve built a solid following with their indie rock sound. They’ve toured, they’ve released albums, and presumably Luppen has been doing all of this while carrying around the knowledge that there’s something growing in his brain. That’s not just dedication to your craft, that’s… I don’t even know what to call it. Resilience? Denial? Maybe a bit of both?

And now everything stops. Or at least pauses. Because what else can you do when you need six hours of brain surgery? The band’s schedule, touring plans, whatever they had lined up – all of it takes a backseat to the very literal fight for his life that’s about to happen in an operating room.

What This Actually Means

The thing that gets me about this whole situation is how quietly catastrophic it is. Luppen didn’t collapse on stage. There wasn’t some dramatic emergency. It was routine scans and persistent symptoms that finally added up to “we need to open your skull and fix this.” That’s somehow scarier than a sudden crisis, you know? The slow-building realization that something’s been wrong for years.

I hope the surgery goes well. I hope the team he’s trusting is as good as he believes they are. And I hope we’re talking about this in a few months as a success story rather than… the alternative. But right now, all we can do is wait until November 6th and hope that six hours is enough time to fix what’s been broken. Or growing. Or whatever the hell has been happening in Jake Luppen’s brain for the past seven years. Health crises don't discriminate by age or profession – just ask about Lydia Plath's heartbreaking loss at 22, another young life upended by news no one should face.

Sometimes the scariest stories are the ones that start with a headache and end with a fight you never saw coming.