Andy & Sara Staple Cancer Support

Dear friends, Andy and Sara Staple need a few miracles...Your prayers, well wishes, and support for them during this exceedingly difficult time are coveted.

Sara shared the following from the ICU yesterday, February 12th, 2024:

"Andy and I met in 9th grade during global history class. I came up with this great idea to ask to borrow his pencil as my lame excuse to start talking to him. He started carrying my books from class to class even when it made him late to his own. We’ve been together for almost 24 years, married for almost 15 and have never left each other’s side. We’ve been blessed by two beautiful children (10 and 11) and up until the last couple weeks, everything was normal.

In early January, Andy had a stomach pain that wouldn’t go away. We tried all the usual over the counter things for a couple weeks until it seemed it might be his gallbladder or something. His general physician sent him for bloodwork and many other tests. They each kept coming back with more bad news.

On Monday, February 5th, we met with an oncologist who told us the official bad news. Andy has stage 4 colon cancer. It has spread to this liver, lung, adrenal gland and kidney. His liver is so filled with tumors that chemotherapy is the only option as his liver was shutting down. The next day, they put in his chemo port and on Wednesday, February 7th, he got his first dose of chemo. We waited anxiously to see if the meds could shrink the tumors to get the liver functioning enough to come up with a new plan on fighting the rest of this.

Unfortunately, by Saturday morning Andy was struggling to breathe. The Dr. had us take him to the emergency room where they discovered blood clots in his lungs and legs (caused by the cancer). They operated that night to find that 50% of one lobe wasn’t even functioning due to the clots. The clots were also causing his heart to swell. They were able to remove many of the clots, but not all. We are in ICU now and are hoping the clots will start to dissipate. Once we get this taken care of, we can go back to fighting this horrible disease."

Andy and Sara are sacrificial givers and always among the first to help meet the needs of others. True to both of their natures, they would never consider asking for help themselves. They have humbly given permission for us to support them in this way. While none of us can provide everything they may need during this time, a gift to use toward their deductible, out of pocket expenses, or even $10 for 1 day of parking at the hospital would be a great blessing.

We're starting this fundraiser with a goal of $1,000 with full faith that it will be blown out of the water and will need to be adjusted upward. All proceeds from this fundraiser will go directly to Sara for medical expenses, family needs, and other expenses that may arise.

With gratitude for your love and care of our friends/colleagues, Andy and Sara,

Jim Peltier and Jamie Rambo

(Sara's colleagues/friends in Lynchburg, VA)