Are you willing to help Jeff & Patti?

On December 19th, 2023, my dad Jeff, the kindest, most loving, toughest protector and overcomer I have ever met, found himself in the bathroom of his workplace clenching his stomach in agony, utter and near absolute agony.

Pain radiated in waves across the left side of his body like the pounding waves of a Pacific Ocean tsunami, when he realized the gravity of his situation.

Something clearly wasn’t right.

Several minutes later, he was in an ambulance racing to the emergency room in Bend, OR.

After exhausting the resources at St. Charles due to the gravity of his situation, he was whisked away via aircraft, AirLinked to Providence Medical Center in Portland, OR where the medical bills would begin to stack mile high.

Though my family's insurance is wonderful, somehow the American medical system has still found a way to extract their pound of flesh from the hardworking, responsible, and society-wide value-adding families that do their best to be their best and enrich their communities and punish them with ungodly medical fees.

Allow me to explain the gravity of his situation and why he - at the time of this writing - is likely to not leave the ICU any time soon and why we are asking for your help and hope.

Roughly a decade ago my dad had a Nissen Fundoplication surgery, a surgery intended to treat serious cases of acid reflux disease.

The surgery wraps the stomach around the base of the esophagus and prevents acid from escaping the stomach.

This is lovely for moments when acid reflux disease would otherwise create discomfort but hell when one needs to vomit due to food poisoning or other illness as the procedure disallows patients from ever being able to vomit.

This is where the injury emerged.

In November my dad had a dry heaving episode that led to the wrap of the Fundoplication surgery herniating which constrained the tissue structures in the fold area.

This led to a necrosis of tissue under his diaphragm which led to a perforation of his stomach lining.

This ‘perf’ (hole) as they call it, allowed fluid and food particles to leak into the pleural space surrounding his lung and eventually collapsed his left lung.

In layman's terms?

Imagine the fluid from every drink you take leaking into your chest cavity, pooling around your lungs, with no place to go, to exit, no way out.

Just sitting there pooling flirting with sepsis if left unaddressed.

Then imagine that happening at a slow rate for over a month, leading to ~7 liters (picture a 2-liter soda bottle times 3 surrounding your lung).

Yes, 3 different 2 litter soda bottles pooled around your lungs creating agony like being drug through hell.

This led to a lung collapse and a near-impossible time breathing.

The technical term for this is again…hell.

I'll spare you the details of the chest tube that drained all the fluid, the intubations and subsequent hell he endured, the endless coughing with a hole in his chest, and the other details but will instead leave you with a request I never thought we'd need to make a family...

A shot at hope and avoidance of financial damnation from the looming suffocating medical bills that will ensue despite my family being extremely diligent and prudent with their insurance selection.

You’ve heard every angle and attempt under the sun begging, kicking and screaming of people asking for help through slick and sly sales tricks.

Hell, you’ve probably shunned a homeless man straight out of sheer annoyance as he somehow rudely, though you were his lifeline, “spare some change?” I certainly have.

That all aside I’ll just ask you point blank…

Are you willing to help my parents Jeff & Patti avert the coming financial onslaught they may face when that dreaded white envelope shows up with their total due to the hospital?

If we are somehow pleasantly surprised and the insurance company covers the cost of the exorbitant medical costs that will inevitably surpass a week in ICU, two weeks (at a minimum of being on a PICC line to feed him), the two ambulance rides, the 200-mile+ Air Link flight that allow will likely cost 10s of thousands and the endless procedures and bedtime, and the god only knows how many cat scans he's had, we pledge to return all the funds to the donators.

If however, you have no interest in offering your support, that is of course, OK.

You do not need to feel any sort of guilt or pressure to help as we are all in different places financially and with our ability to give I get that.

If however you CAN give and are willing to give, know that YOU are contributing to the creation of hope, and for that, we are forever indebted to you.

In fact, you might be a key contributing member that saves our family from financial ruin.

Loving you either way.

The Evans Family