(Please keep this a secret from Matt and Emily, we want this to be a surprise)  

As most of you know, our friend Matt Sudol is up against a big challenge over the next six months to a year. If you are lucky enough to be a friend of Matt’s, you know he is a very special guy.  No one should have to go through fighting cancer, and this truly feels unfair with Matt.

It is difficult sometimes to find the positive words of encouragement or to think of a gift that may be helpful in this situation. In difficult times, especially when fighting off an illness; bills and financial hardship is the last thing our friend should be worried about.

 Today Matt starts his Chemo. Our goal over the next few weeks is to generate enough money for Matt to set up an account specifically for medical related costs. Co-pays, hospital bills, prescription drugs, dog walking, food to-go, flights for his Mother to visit from San Diego. All of these things cost money and will pile up quickly. We don’t want Matt to hesitate doing what is best for him because of cost.

We hope to keep this “GoFundMe” page a secret from Matt and Emily until we hit our goal and can surprise them. With that in mind, while social media is a great avenue to spread the word, this is a very private topic, and we would appreciate if word is spread only by mouth and via email. Please respect their privacy in this matter.

Matt's current situation:
Over the past 5 weeks, Matt has had many doctors’ appointments, MRI’s, CT scans, PET scans, full body bone scans and (2) surgical biopsies.

A few weeks ago, Matt and Emily met his Lymphoma specialist at Stanford Medical Center to receive his diagnosis and treatment plan moving forward. 

He has been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma (large B-cell lymphoma) in his right tibia. While this cancer is very common, his case is very unusual based on its location and his age. Typically this cancer begins in lymph nodes and may progress to the bones, but as far as they can tell, it started within his bone and has affected approximately 18cm of the right tibia. 

Moving forward, treatment will consist of (6) cycles of chemotherapy - each cycle is (1) day of chemo with (3) weeks off in between. The plan is to start this treatment Friday , August 12, 2016. Following the chemo, he will then undergo radiation treatment for several weeks. Throughout the process, they will be monitoring his blood counts, heart condition, kidney/liver condition, etc. along with body scans to ensure the chemo is working properly.
 
Thank you in advance for your support.