Tyson’s fight with a rare Brain Tumour

Hi my name is Saldana. I have started this GoFund Me for my nephew Tyson. His mother has been one of my closest friends for the past 30 years. Tyson along with his siblings know me as their aunty.

Tyson was recently diagnosed with a Germinoma Tumour, that is located in his Brain. This is the same tumour that his older brother Cody was diagnosed with 5 years ago. As this tumour has now affected two out of four of my friends children, she has been told they will further investigate if this is potentially genetic, and why her children are getting them.

A germinoma is a rare, soft tissue density tumor that originates in germ cells, the cells that form eggs or sperm. They are the most common type of germ cell tumor in the central nervous system and are usually found in the brain. Germinomas can occur when germ cells get trapped in the brain during fetal development instead of migrating to the reproductive organs. The prognosis for recovery is quite high and treatable. Although his diagnosis is only recent we are very hopeful he will make a full recovery.

Tysons symptoms started roughly three months ago, with a sudden onset of depression. His mom took him to their family doctor where he under went some standard blood work, as everything checked out normal he was prescribed an antidepressant, which did help for a short period. He was able to return to his part time job at Freshco and continued his studies at Peter Skene Ogden Secondary School.

About a month after his diagnosis with depression Tyson made his mother aware that he was having problems with his vision being blurry. As Tyson does already have visual challenges and wears prescription glasses, his mom took him first to their family physician where they decided to wean down on his antidepressant, as blurry vision is a potential side effect of the medication, and then booked an appointment with their ophthalmologist to further investigate. Their ophthalmologist found that Tysons eyes appeared healthy, but recommended a MRI to ensure nothing more insidious was going on. As they awaited the MRI appointment Tyson’s vision became severely impeded and his mother rushed him to their local hospital where he underwent a CAT Scan which revealed Tyson’s Brain Tumour. He was rushed to Children’s Hospital in Vancouver where he is currently residing and received his diagnosis of a Germinoma Tumour.

At this time Tyson’s tumour is too large to operate on. With the tumour impeding on his optic nerve, and affecting his pineal glad, he is receiving an extensive and aggressive course of radiation coupled with chemotherapy to begin on Monday in hopes to shrink his tumour enough to hopefully save his vision.

At this time Tyson’s prognosis is unknown, and as you can imagine with just having underwent her first sons diagnosis, and treatment, and now her second sons diagnosis and treatment financially its been one hit after another, with no time to recover. Due to the rural area in which they live, Children’s hospital needs them to acquire housing closer to the hospital. Which is roughly a four month stay away from their home. As Tyson’s mom is the main financial provider for their home, due to his father having his own health issues there has been immense worry over how they will make ends meet with her leave from work to navigate Tyson’s treatments, along with medication costs for his treatments, relocating for his treatment, and transportation back and forth for her husband and their other three children to visit Tyson and herself in hospital, so she has that much needed support from her family.

I’m so very hopeful that this fundraiser will relieve some of the financial burden they are facing in the following months.

Thank you for taking the time to read and share this GOFund Me, and donate.

Much Love and Light.

Saldana