Unexpected Brain Tumor Removal

My name is Samantha, and I never in a million years wanted to have to create something like this for people I love so dearly. But, as life likes to do sometimes, a curveball has been thrown.

My sweet brother-in-law, Eric Hopkins, who is a brand new dad to a sweet almost 3-month-old baby boy, has been having headaches for months. After countless doctors telling him it was probably nothing, he went to the Emergency Room on Wednesday night. At the prompting of my mother-in-law, they finally did a CT scan and found a mass in his brain. He was taken immediately to St. Mark’s Hospital to be seen by a neurosurgeon as soon as possible. After a whirlwind of a few days, they have decided to operate tomorrow morning.

The operation is extremely complex as the tumor is in a very difficult space and, given the nature of the tumor, is extremely vascular. The neurosurgeon has actually decided to be second in command to a vascular surgeon who has only seen this type of tumor in this place one other time in his 25 years of practice. There are multiple complications that can arise from this, and the surgery is likely to take anywhere from 6-12+ hours. At that point, pathology will be done, and they will find out whether this is cancerous or not. Then, he will need to have a drain put in and is expected to have to stay in the ICU for 3-5 days. From there, he will likely be in the hospital for longer. The road to recovery is not easy either, and rehabilitation may be needed as well as other measures given what pathology finds.

As I said before, Eric is a brand new father. His wife, Kenna, just had a perfect baby boy on September 9th. She was scheduled to return to work on Thursday, and then all of this happened. They both have used most of the PTO/leave they have accrued due to maternity and paternity leave and are looking at a long road of not only medical bills but the need for time off that they don’t have. They never in a million years would ask for this, but I felt it necessary to just try to ask for help for them to alleviate the stress of any financial burden this is going to incur. I also am just asking for prayers for them as we need all of those that we can get. We love Eric more than he will ever understand, so please, if you can, pray, send love, send good thoughts, and anything else you are able to contribute.