A Mission For Mcquistion

My name is Scott and I’ve spent the last few years getting to call Matt McQuistion my best friend. Our friendship was pretty immediate when we met at work and started bonding over various nerd things. Matt is an avid gamer that meddles in board games, card games, and video games but most of all he enjoys being a father to his (almost) two year old daughter, Freya, and son, Dean. Unfortunately Matt has recently fallen upon a hardship due to what they believe is the return of Transverse Myelitis. Those who know Matt know that he had it in the past and conquered it through a ton of hard work including maintaining a gym routine multiple times a week to keep everything moving and getting stronger. 

In late July of this year, Matt noticed a tingle in his hand and a strange numbness in his left leg. He knew these symptoms well as it was exactly how it started before. This time he didn’t wait around to start getting ahead of it. He immediately made some calls and a few friends pulled some strings for him and he got an MRI on August 7th in Sioux Falls. The results from that MRI were that the doctors believed that it is again, Transverse Myelitis.

Transverse myelitis is an inflammation of both sides of one section of the spinal cord. This neurological disorder often damages the insulating material covering nerve cell fibers (myelin). Transverse myelitis interrupts the messages that the spinal cord nerves send throughout the body. This can cause pain, muscle weakness, paralysis, and sensory problems. With Matt, it is mainly his left side that is affected and he’s currently utilizing a cane to help get around and keep his mobility up. Despite his efforts to hide it, there is a lot of pain in any sort of movement he makes which makes day to day tasks miserable for him. Matt currently has done a round of steroids and plasma transfusions that have put him through hell and the road ahead is going to be very long and challenging for him and his family.

My reason for creating this GoFundMe is to help alleviate some of the financial hardships put on him and Melissa that have come from this unexpected diagnosis. All support received will go towards doctors appointments, transportation, treatments and the duties of being a father. Recently Matt has also become unemployed and with his insurance running out at the end of September we want to try to get ahead of it. The donations will give him and his family some peace of mind as it’s been a struggle to stay positive and keep their heads above water. One of the hardest things to do is to ask for help from your friends, family, and community which is why I'm asking for them.

Matt has been a pretty active member of our community as he was a CNA, a member of the Pierre Players for a few plays, and worked as a Technician at Central Dakota Eyecare. At CDE, Matt headed the community outreach program that went to our local long term care facilities to adjust and repair the resident's glasses. He’s truly one of those people that would literally give you the shirt off his back without a second thought. At one point early this year, I had a leak under my kitchen in a crawl space. We had the leak repaired but there was a large pool of standing water and Matt crawled in and dried it up. He also made sure that the new pipe was not leaking. He's just an all-around genuinely good human.

The turning point to making this GoFundMe was after a chat I had with Melissa saying that things are very tight and that they are thinking of selling their house and moving in with her parents because right now, the sole income of the household is from Melissa. She is currently trying to balance out four jobs, be a mother, and a spouse to Matt. She’s trying her best to make ends meet and doing an incredible job but they need a little help. Anything would be appreciated to help lighten their load and get through these dark days they've been hit with.