Join Connor's Journey to Overcome Cancer

Mary Loeb has been my best friend for over 25 years, and I have started this on behalf of her family.

The Loeb Family recently found out that their 25-year-old son, Connor, has been diagnosed with an aggressive form of non-Hodgkins Lymphoma and will require chemotherapy treatments at the Cleveland Clinic. In March of 2024, Connor started having severe pain in his left shin making it hard for him to bear weight on that leg. After a few weeks of being in pain, he discovered a lump just under his knee so he went to his primary doctor for evaluation. His Dr. told him it was probably from working out too hard and gave him a cortisone shot and pain meds. In November, Connor went back to his Dr. because the lump was still there, and he had to cut back on his workouts due to discomfort in his leg. An UltraSound showed a soft tissue mass in his left shin bone. Four days before his 25th birthday, his worst fears came to life. An MRI indicated that the mass was likely malignant. We were referred to The Hope Center in Youngstown and the oncologist there immediately scheduled a PET Scan. A week later, he learned that he has a 4.8 cm soft tissue mass in his left shin bone and surrounding tissue, as well as a 1.3 cm mass in his left groin lymph node. Connor was referred to Cleveland Clinic for further evaluations. While waiting to go to Cleveland, Connor had a tissue biopsy of the leg mass at a local hospital. The next week he went to Cleveland to learn that preliminary results indicated Lymphoma, however, not enough tissue was taken from the first biopsy. He had to go back up to Cleveland to have a second biopsy on his leg, and a bone marrow biopsy from his hip. All of the testing showed that Connor has High Grade Large B-Cell Non Hodgkin Lymphoma, which is an aggressive cancer. Over the next five months Connor will have chemotherapy every 21 days at the Cleveland Clinic. Connor is currently unemployed due to the unfortunate timing of his diagnosis. He worked for a local lawn care and landscaping company and was diagnosed just as the work season ended. He is unable to find new work right now due to the amount of appointments and unknown reactions to the chemotherapy treatments. Mary and Dave are committed to supporting Connor throughout this difficult time by accompanying him to his treatments and other appointments , as well as financially. Unfortunately, being present with Connor equals not being as present at work. This limits their ability to help Connor with his expenses, especially due to their own increased need for gas as they travel from Austintown to Cleveland. Please consider donating to Connor’s fight against cancer.