Support Brad in his battle with Stage 4 Cancer

Hello! My husband Brad Centers is currently battling stage 4 colorectal cancer. Before his diagnosis Brad enjoyed being outdoors, whether it be hiking, hunting arrowheads, or working in his garden. He enjoys animals of all kinds and has become quite the bird watcher. He enjoys UK sports, particularly football and basketball, and he loves dirt track racing.

He would not hesitate to help a friend in need. And after much discussion, we decided to make this fundraiser to humbly ask our friends, family, and anyone who may have it on their heart to help out, to donate toward Brad’s medical bills/expenses.

Our journey began back in late June 2022 when Brad became ill with what we thought was a stomach virus: nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain. After a trip to the ER, he was very bluntly told he had cancer, the tumor was totally blocking his colon, he had multiple lesions throughout his liver, and he would need surgery right away. Talk about being blindsided! That led to him being transferred to another facility where he had a flexible sigmoidoscopy to view the tumor. The surgeon spoke to him about performing a bowel resection with colostomy placement the next day. All of this was very overwhelming and she allowed him time to consider everything. The following day, after much discussion, he decided to have the surgery and it would be scheduled the next day. But then his colon perforated that evening. This resulted in emergency surgery with bowel resection and an ileostomy was placed.

Our “new normal” took some time getting adjusted to. Before he worked 40-50 hours per week and was outside doing things on his days off. Now we were keeping up with medications, managing his ileostomy, figuring what he could & couldn’t eat, a total lifestyle change. I was working full time but now we were down to one income. Brad applied for his disability but had to be out of work for 5 months before he could even receive it, with no back pay. Thanks to friends, family and coworkers we made it through.

About a month after the surgery he began chemo at a local cancer center. He received treatment every 2 weeks for 12 cycles. Scans showed all clear after this, which seemed too good to be true. And of course, it was.

The original surgeon had referred Brad to a surgeon at the University of Kentucky. Up to this point, all of his medical costs had been covered due to our insurance. However, anything outside of a particular healthcare system is basically not covered due to the conditions of our insurance plan. So once he began his cancer journey at the University of Kentucky we started to acquire lots of medical debt.

We met with two different surgeons in February 2023: one to discuss liver resection and one to discuss bowel resection of the primary tumor with possible ostomy reversal, something we were uncertain would ever happen for him. After some roadblocks and setbacks, Brad was able to have a multilobar liver resection, ostomy reversal, resection of primary tumor and bowel reconnect. It was a 10+ hour surgery.

One week at UK and we were headed home to start the healing process all over again and wait for the other shoe to drop.

Toward the end of May/beginning of June 2023 we followed up with both surgeons. Scans revealed recurrence of his cancer in the liver. Just heartbreaking. To see him go through so much in a year and know he had so much more to go. We then were referred to a different surgeon at UK for the placement of an HAI (hepatic artery infusion) pump. This is a small pump implanted in your abdomen that delivers chemo directly into the liver.

Because this is a fairly new treatment that is only offered at UK in the state, his chemo and care was transferred to Lexington. Brad endured yet another abdominal surgery in June 2023, a few weeks prior to his one year anniversary of being diagnosed.

After a few weeks of healing, we began traveling to Lexington (approximately 2 hours one way from our home) every two weeks for his chemo treatments. We are still making the 4 hour round trip every two weeks. There have been hiccups and missed treatments, but latest scans show stability in liver lesions with no spread to other areas currently. As of now, Brad is looking at another 3 months of biweekly treatments. More scans hopefully in May will determine treatment going further.

Brad’s care teams at UK have been wonderful. And I truly feel like he is where he needs to be. But as I mentioned before, our insurance doesn’t fully cover his care at UK and we have racked up quite a bit of medical debt. We make monthly payments and pay what we can when we can. But they have started sending his debt to collections and this has become a large source of stress for Brad, in a time when he really doesn’t need any more stress.

My hope is that we will be able to raise enough money with this fundraiser to pay off his medical debt. Anything left over (if any) will be used toward future treatments/surgeries and gas money to travel to appointments/treatments. Due to my income, we do not qualify for any kind of government assistance, any kind of financial assistance, and they don’t take into account any other bills/expenses you have. Any savings we had was depleted due to having one income. Nobody plans to get sick. Nobody plans to be diagnosed with stage 4 cancer at the age of 40. But it can happen to anyone so get your screenings.

If you want to and are able, please donate. If you are unable to or just don’t want to, at least pass this on so that it may be seen. Even if we don’t raise money, at least we can raise awareness. If you made it this far, I thank you for taking the time to hear Brad’s story.