Support Our Family's Fight Against Lung Cancer

August 22nd 2024 was by far one of the scariest days of my life. I got a call at 6:32pm informing me that my dad, my best friend was rushed to the hospital. We didn't know anything, only someone called an ambulance for him, he was rushed there and he at the time was having a hard time breathing. The nurse from the hospital called my mom (my other best friend) to tell her this. Literally one of the scariest moments of my life. My aunt came to pick me up and we went to pick my mom up to go to the hospital. This was the longest ride of my life! Our minds racing, not knowing what we were going to hear from the doctor, if he was conscious, okay, or anything. I silently cried the entire way.

Let me give you a little back story before I move on. My mom and dad raised me and my two sisters as well as my cousin/brother (my dad's nephew) to know we could talk to them or come to them about absolutely ANYTHING! There was nothing we couldn't all figure out together. This is why they're my best friends. We are all very close. My parents would give the shirt off of their backs for anyone. And I do mean this literally. They have helped raise friends and other family members too. My dad was always known to ALL of my friends, past or present, that if they couldn't go to anyone else, they could come to him for help. But, my parents never ever ask for help... ever, from anyone. This is why I'm doing this for them.

Back to that horrible day...

We get to the hospital finally! We walk in not knowing what to expect or what exactly to say. We gave his name and said he came in on an ambulance. It took forever for them to find him in the system, we now know because he couldn't give them his info at first. They told us he was in ICU. The panic I felt at that very moment I'll never forget. When we got to the room, I needed to lay eyes on him so I knew he was okay. He had a CPAP machine on his face and I instantly busted out crying with confusion and relief all at the same time... WHAT HAPPENED!? He apparently was driving down the road on 210 and started to feel this intense pain above his stomach area, not his heart, and couldn't breathe. He said he thought he was going to die. He began to panic because he could not catch his breath. He knew somewhere close was a rescue squad so he pulled in and couldn't find it, eventually pulling into a gas station where a man on a motorcycle noticed him and called an ambulance. If I knew who this man was I would give him the biggest hug and thank you ever! He gave our family more days, months and hopefully years with him. Luckily the hospital was only a block away. They didn't have any of his information because he couldn't talk when they brought him in. He was blue and his blood pressure was sky rocketed. Once they got him stable is when he told the nurse to call mom. They told him he didn't have a heart attack, but a warning attack. From there so many tests were done. Ultimately they said the best place for him would be a heart specific hospital. More tests were run. They wanted to get a better look at his heart because they couldn't see what the issue was at the time. They just knew his heart was in distress and they needed to find out why. During one of the scans they did find a mass behind his breast bone, but wasn't sure what it was yet. They decided a small surgery through his vein would help figure out what was going on. August 28th dad went into surgery. We got there right after he was done. As we were walking to recovery he was being rolled in. He looked okay, was sore and tired, but looked okay. The doctor proceeds to come in and give us the news. Three major arteries to his heart were blocked, two 80% and one 90%. The 90% blocked artery had created a bridge to one of his 80% blocked arteries. Crazy how the body works. So the news, they were able to get a good look at the mass and they want to remove it, but a triple bypass was a must also. Devastating news! Scary news! My mom will kill me for this part, but the news again was very devastating and she ended up passing out... twice. Understanding with the news we just received. I was able to get the nurse's attention and when they came in they checked her, put her on a bed and her blood pressure was dangerously low. They were able to get it back up, but not without dad cracking jokes about "I bet you never thought both your parents were going to be in hospital beds next to each other", "she just wanted to steal the attention" lol, all to make us laugh, especially mom. He was worried about her and of course we're all worried about him. So they set up a date, September 4th would be his surgery day. The day they would remove the encased mass and fix his heart. So September 4th at 7am surgery began. This was again the longest day ever! Eleven hours later, Eleven hours at 6:05pm they were finally finished and the surgery was a success. Now we had to wait for the biopsy and dad's heart and body had to do the rest. He went into afib twice over the next week or so. But they were finally able to somewhat get his meds right. He came home September 10th. On September 15th we found out the mass was cancer. Even though it didn't come out of the lungs it had lung cells in it, which meant lung cancer. (Our even bigger journey begins.) On September 24th he was sent back to the hospital. The meds weren't right yet and his oxygen had dropped low. He stayed for a couple of days and came back home. October 1st he went for scans to confirm everything. No more cancer tumors in his body but 8 out of 10 lymph nodes had cancer cells. They wanted to do one more scan on his brain to make sure there was nothing there. And that did come back clear. On November 13th we got more devastating news, my mom's dad, my grandfather suddenly passed. No warning, it was horrible.

My dad had an appointment December 11th with more bad news, where they said he had stage 3 lung cancer (edging stage 4) with no tumors, but again in the lymph nodes (they cannot remove because of location) have cancer cells and they need to begin treatment asap. They want to make sure his heart is strong enough for everything. He will need chemo, radiation and then immunotherapy. Tomorrow, December 19th on my birthday he goes up for another doctor visit to find out when everything will start. I am doing this for my parents. They both deserve the world. They've been stressed about bills and other things my dad will need during this time. If I could relieve even just a little stress for them I will. This year has been a very hard year for them both. For all of us. Christmas will definitely be different this year for us. We're missing someone that's always been there and then my dad going through treatments. Treatment starts Jan 15th. #IHateCancer Thank you for listening to our story. Anything, even if it's a dollar could help. Please keep us all in your thoughts and prayers.