Shorty's Funeral & Medical Bill Expenses

Hi, my name is Leah and the person you probably know as Shorty, was my dad. It breaks my heart to announce that he passed away in his sleep on the morning of Tuesday, November 9th, 2021.

In early 2020 my dad started experiencing some weakness & frequent "sinus infections". He was put on rounds of antibiotics throughout the year because the symptoms would subside, and then return shortly after finishing his medication. After the 3rd round it started raising some concerns, but still none of his doctors really knew what was wrong. This past summer of 2021, he was given a possible diagnosis of ALS, but when he did further testing it was determined that he didn't have it because he did not have one of the major symptoms.

However his symptoms only proceeded to worsen, with more doctors visits and medications. Then in the beginning of August he was officially diagnosed with ALS. The doctor said he must have had it for much longer than anyone thought. Then by the end of August, he contracted Covid-19 and really struggled to get better. He took an ambulance to the hospital to receive antibodies and treatment with an overnight stay.

After this things started progressing even quicker. He took an ambulance to the hospital 2 more times due to not being able to breathe. The second time he spent a longer overnight stay of 4-5 nights. He was expected to go to rehab after this in hopes of prolonging his ALS symptoms to have a quality of life, but by the end of his stay he couldn't walk. He was then told he would be coming home and going on hospice care.

He came home and was on hospice care for about 1.5 weeks before passing in our living room home, in his sleep.

Throughout my dads care my mom ran into a lot of problems with his insurance not being able to cover the machines he needed at home in order to continue breathing, which is why he kept ending up in the hospital. Although the ALS association was helpful in covering the hospice care with his hospital bed and other necessities - his previous medical bills added up with co-pays and many out of pocket visits and expenses. Additionally, his ambulance rides & hospital stays were not fully covered.

I am setting up this Go Fund Me to help alleviate the financial burden for my mother of everything mentioned above, and for his service expenses. He requested to have a wake, to be cremated, and have a service at his favorite golf course that he played regularly. It would be such a massive help to have this fully covered for my family. I am also hoping that the extra money can help my mom to get things fixed around her house that have been put to the side and to help her recover from a knee surgery that she needs very soon. She put it off for a while in order to take care of my dad, and she is in a lot of pain because of it. She will have a 6ish week recovery time and will need help with cleaning her home among other things, so I would like to also relieve that burden from her as well.

Although my dad was aging and was 78 years old, if he was not given this diagnosis he would have been kickin' around much longer with all of us. My mom should not have to worry about all the financial aspects associated with losing her husband of 41 years.

He was such a strong and incredible dad, friend, grandpa, uncle, and many other things and we will miss him more than we can ever put into words. We appreciate and are forever grateful for any support and love during this difficult time.