Matthew Holbreich was a senior in college when the swelling started. He originally thought he had injured his left leg playing squash, but the intensity of the swelling scared him. After seeing a few doctors in Boston, where he was living at the time, he eventually was referred to Stanford Medicine's Stanley Rockson, M.D. A trip across the country resulted in a new diagnosis: lymphedema, a condition in which excess lymph fluid accumulates in a patient's arms or legs rather than draining through the lymphatic system into the bloodstream as it should.