My name is Taje La Barbera. In November of 2024, at the young age of just 18, what I thought were just bad back pains and unbearable headaches soon turned to blood clots in my mouth and legs, which prompted my mom to take me to the ER because the pain became so unbearable for me to endure. As the ER physicians ran several blood and imaging tests, my blood results came back where my white blood cells were way out of the normal range, resulting in myself being diagnosed with APL Leukemia (cancer of the blood). I was then referred immediately via ambulance to a major hospital in the city of Chicago to be seen by some of the best doctors on the oncology team, where I spent some time undergoing numerous blood transfusions, tests, bone marrow procedures, and therapy. To date, I am still undergoing treatment and therapy and will be for a while from now. I am humbly asking please for any assistance, no matter how small, to help finish my treatment and therapy as from November 2024 to now, my adopted father and my mom have been trying to keep up with what our insurance doesn’t cover.