MAKE WAYNE’S DREAM COME TRUE,
Donazione protetta
Life can be hard at times, Wayne Higgs is my uncle and I am heading up this go fund me campaign for him. This story below is written by his wife, my uncle is a strong man and has been fighting a hard fight. Not a man to ask for help, but always one to give. If you were given a time limit to fullfill your dreams, what would you do?
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Our dream trip was for Wayne and I to do the Alaskan cruise and to experience the ride on the Rocky Mountaineer through the Rocky Mountain in Canada, with a short stopover in the USA. We planned and started to save up for the trip and it was almost within our reach until Wayne was diagnosed with cancer almost 2 years ago.
The nightmare began in September 2014 when Wayne went in for an operation to clear the blockage in his sinus cavity. The surgeon who operated on him discovered that there was an abnormality in the tissue along with a chunky growth he took out from Wayne’s sinus cavity, which he immediately sent a sample of it to the pathology lab to be tested. The result came back as high grade carcinoma and it’s confirmed that Wayne was suffering from Maxillary cancer (adenocarcinoma) which had to be operated on.
Wayne underwent a few more operations since then, one which took out most of the bone structure in the right side of his face including the top upper jaw and half the roof of his mouth. They then reconstructed this using the Rectus muscles from the right side of his stomach. This operation alone took 16 and a half long hours.
Wayne had to endure pain and discomfort for months while recovering from that operation. Then he had to undergo a set of uncomfortable and stressful radiotherapy treatment. Due to the extent of the cancer, he had to undergo 37 sessions of the radiotherapy treatment.
He completed the radiotherapy thinking that if there are any cancer cells left, the extensive radiotherapy treatment would have killed it. To our horror, four weeks later another tumour formed above his right eye. So, begrudgingly he went back to the operating theatre to have the tumour removed. This time they had to remove the whole eye, the eye lid, part of the lining of his brain and more bone structure from the right side of his face. After that operation, he was left with a big hole in his right eye socket which was stuffed with a thing called “Bip” dressing (looks like fettuccini) and an eye patch over it. The area around the eye socket had to be cleaned daily and the “Bip” dressing had to be replaced every two weeks.
A few months later, it’s back to the operating theatre to reconstruct the right eye socket. In that operation the plastic surgeon refilled and rebuilt Wayne’s right eye socket with tissue and skin taken from his forehead and rebuilt his forehead with grafts from his upper right thigh. He suffered so much pain and discomfort while recovering from that operation. Even though he is a fighter, he felt broken, being patched up everywhere, having part of his stomach in his mouth, part of his forehead in his eye socket and his thigh skin on his forehead. Still, we were thankful then because he is still alive and from the initial MRI and PET scans, his ENT specialist informed us that he was all cleared. We were able to heave a big sigh of relieve and thought to ourselves, all the pain and discomfort that Wayne had been through since September 2014 is now going to be in the past and we can move forward.
Sad to say, Wayne wasn’t that fortunate. Last month, when his latest MRI scan result came through, his ENT specialist broke the devastating news. They’ve discovered that another tumour had formed around the base of his spinal cord which houses all the nerves and veins which supply blood to his brain. I thought, OMG here we go again, another operation. Unfortunately, the specialist told us that where the tumour is located, it is inoperable. If they attempt to operate on it, Wayne would only have a 10% chance of survival. We were informed that since it is inoperable, Wayne’s life expectancy is now reduced to between 6 to 12 months. The news was a huge blow to us. It was and still is very hard to comprehend what we’ve been told and even harder to believe that it is really happening.
The only option left for Wayne is to undergo extensive chemotherapy in the attempt to control the growth of the cancer and hopefully to buy him some extra time on earth. Though we were told that there is no guarantee it will work, Wayne is willing to grab any chance available with both hands. Due to the rarity of his cancer and where it is located, there is not much research done or known knowledge to the medical profession in regards to what type of effective chemotherapy drug they could use to target the cancer cell in his head. So the oncologist who is treating him has decided to hit him with some old school chemotherapy drug called Cisplatin for one day, followed by four days of Fluorouracil and a 16 days break/rest to recover. This drug is known to have huge side effects on the patients. Wayne has so far undergone the first round of 5-day chemotherapy and is now resting at home before the second round of 5-day chemotherapy in 16 days time. The oncologist planned for him to undergo six rounds of chemotherapy in total, doing an MRI scan after the third round to check on the progress. Wayne is coping ok so far but the oncologist did warn us that the side effects will get worse as the days progress. Fantastic! (NOT)
Our financial situation has suffered enormously since Wayne has been sick and unable to work a great deal for the past 18 months. We’ve exhausted all our resources. We’ve claimed and spent most of Wayne’s superannuation fund, re-mortgaged our home, maxed out both credit cards and used up our savings for the Alaskan cruise and Rocky Mountaineer ride.
What do you do when you are told that your number is up? What do you do when you realised, though still unwilling to accept the reality, that you’ve only have a very limited life span? Well, after the initial shock from hearing the devastating news about Wayne’s predicament, I asked him what he would really like to do before he leaves this world. He thought hard and came to the conclusion that if there is nothing else he could do, he would really want to create a lasting memory with his loved ones. He said that he would love to create a wonderful memory with me by going on the Alaskan cruise and to ride on the Rocky Mountaineer. Then it made us feel really sad because this last wish might not be realised due to our financial constrains. Time is running out and we don’t have the luxury of starting all over, to save up money for our dream holiday.
Eric suggested that we do a “go fund me” and try to raise enough fund for the trip. At first, Wayne said no because to him it felt like begging. It is not in his making to ask for handouts. In our hearts we still feel uneasy asking strangers and possibly friends to help. However, under the circumstances without your generosity and kindness, this last wish of Wayne’s will not be fulfilled. So thank you very much to everyone who has reached out to help us. Your generosity and kindness will forever be remembered and we are truly grateful.
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Our dream trip was for Wayne and I to do the Alaskan cruise and to experience the ride on the Rocky Mountaineer through the Rocky Mountain in Canada, with a short stopover in the USA. We planned and started to save up for the trip and it was almost within our reach until Wayne was diagnosed with cancer almost 2 years ago.
The nightmare began in September 2014 when Wayne went in for an operation to clear the blockage in his sinus cavity. The surgeon who operated on him discovered that there was an abnormality in the tissue along with a chunky growth he took out from Wayne’s sinus cavity, which he immediately sent a sample of it to the pathology lab to be tested. The result came back as high grade carcinoma and it’s confirmed that Wayne was suffering from Maxillary cancer (adenocarcinoma) which had to be operated on.
Wayne underwent a few more operations since then, one which took out most of the bone structure in the right side of his face including the top upper jaw and half the roof of his mouth. They then reconstructed this using the Rectus muscles from the right side of his stomach. This operation alone took 16 and a half long hours.
Wayne had to endure pain and discomfort for months while recovering from that operation. Then he had to undergo a set of uncomfortable and stressful radiotherapy treatment. Due to the extent of the cancer, he had to undergo 37 sessions of the radiotherapy treatment.
He completed the radiotherapy thinking that if there are any cancer cells left, the extensive radiotherapy treatment would have killed it. To our horror, four weeks later another tumour formed above his right eye. So, begrudgingly he went back to the operating theatre to have the tumour removed. This time they had to remove the whole eye, the eye lid, part of the lining of his brain and more bone structure from the right side of his face. After that operation, he was left with a big hole in his right eye socket which was stuffed with a thing called “Bip” dressing (looks like fettuccini) and an eye patch over it. The area around the eye socket had to be cleaned daily and the “Bip” dressing had to be replaced every two weeks.
A few months later, it’s back to the operating theatre to reconstruct the right eye socket. In that operation the plastic surgeon refilled and rebuilt Wayne’s right eye socket with tissue and skin taken from his forehead and rebuilt his forehead with grafts from his upper right thigh. He suffered so much pain and discomfort while recovering from that operation. Even though he is a fighter, he felt broken, being patched up everywhere, having part of his stomach in his mouth, part of his forehead in his eye socket and his thigh skin on his forehead. Still, we were thankful then because he is still alive and from the initial MRI and PET scans, his ENT specialist informed us that he was all cleared. We were able to heave a big sigh of relieve and thought to ourselves, all the pain and discomfort that Wayne had been through since September 2014 is now going to be in the past and we can move forward.
Sad to say, Wayne wasn’t that fortunate. Last month, when his latest MRI scan result came through, his ENT specialist broke the devastating news. They’ve discovered that another tumour had formed around the base of his spinal cord which houses all the nerves and veins which supply blood to his brain. I thought, OMG here we go again, another operation. Unfortunately, the specialist told us that where the tumour is located, it is inoperable. If they attempt to operate on it, Wayne would only have a 10% chance of survival. We were informed that since it is inoperable, Wayne’s life expectancy is now reduced to between 6 to 12 months. The news was a huge blow to us. It was and still is very hard to comprehend what we’ve been told and even harder to believe that it is really happening.
The only option left for Wayne is to undergo extensive chemotherapy in the attempt to control the growth of the cancer and hopefully to buy him some extra time on earth. Though we were told that there is no guarantee it will work, Wayne is willing to grab any chance available with both hands. Due to the rarity of his cancer and where it is located, there is not much research done or known knowledge to the medical profession in regards to what type of effective chemotherapy drug they could use to target the cancer cell in his head. So the oncologist who is treating him has decided to hit him with some old school chemotherapy drug called Cisplatin for one day, followed by four days of Fluorouracil and a 16 days break/rest to recover. This drug is known to have huge side effects on the patients. Wayne has so far undergone the first round of 5-day chemotherapy and is now resting at home before the second round of 5-day chemotherapy in 16 days time. The oncologist planned for him to undergo six rounds of chemotherapy in total, doing an MRI scan after the third round to check on the progress. Wayne is coping ok so far but the oncologist did warn us that the side effects will get worse as the days progress. Fantastic! (NOT)
Our financial situation has suffered enormously since Wayne has been sick and unable to work a great deal for the past 18 months. We’ve exhausted all our resources. We’ve claimed and spent most of Wayne’s superannuation fund, re-mortgaged our home, maxed out both credit cards and used up our savings for the Alaskan cruise and Rocky Mountaineer ride.
What do you do when you are told that your number is up? What do you do when you realised, though still unwilling to accept the reality, that you’ve only have a very limited life span? Well, after the initial shock from hearing the devastating news about Wayne’s predicament, I asked him what he would really like to do before he leaves this world. He thought hard and came to the conclusion that if there is nothing else he could do, he would really want to create a lasting memory with his loved ones. He said that he would love to create a wonderful memory with me by going on the Alaskan cruise and to ride on the Rocky Mountaineer. Then it made us feel really sad because this last wish might not be realised due to our financial constrains. Time is running out and we don’t have the luxury of starting all over, to save up money for our dream holiday.
Eric suggested that we do a “go fund me” and try to raise enough fund for the trip. At first, Wayne said no because to him it felt like begging. It is not in his making to ask for handouts. In our hearts we still feel uneasy asking strangers and possibly friends to help. However, under the circumstances without your generosity and kindness, this last wish of Wayne’s will not be fulfilled. So thank you very much to everyone who has reached out to help us. Your generosity and kindness will forever be remembered and we are truly grateful.
Organizzatore
Ilona Klung
Organizzatore
Falcon, WA