Update 8/17 7:06PM - Aaron is home! Thank you all so much for your kindness and donations and well-wishes. We’ve surpassed the gofundme goal. It’s going to help so much with this surgery and hospital stay. He’s just been discharged. More healing to follow. Thank you

Update 8/17 10:22AM - Thank you to everyone for your outpouring of love and support. Thank you. Aaron’s white blood cell count is down today (yay!) and he was able to stand up for a few minutes. Your generosity is overwhelming.

Update 8/16 8:20PM - Thank you all so very much for your donations. Aaron was so overwhelmed, he cried. (I’ve never seen him cry before.) I’m trying to get him to rest right now, but please know the tremendous impact your generosity his having. You will all be receiving handwritten thank you notes. ❤️

-M

Hi everyone,

I’m Molly, Aaron’s partner, and I’ve been with him over the last several days as we’ve navigated emergency gallbladder surgery, multiple ER visits, and an ongoing in-patient hospital stay.

On 8/13, around 8:30PM, Aaron and I had just gotten back inside from a walk with our dog, another normal night as usual, when suddenly Aaron crumpled to the ground with a crippling pain in his abdomen and back. Money has been tight and he’s got an incredibly high pain tolerance, so we waited to see if things would resolve on their own. Unfortunately, his symptoms continued to worsen and we ended up in the ER.

We checked in around 12:30AM and luckily he was seen quickly. After several hours of blood work and lab tests including a CT scan that came back clean, we were told that his stomach wasn’t emptying properly, causing it to press on his other organs. So we got some medicine and were sent home with the diagnosis of gastroparesis.

The next day was much better, until the afternoon, when Aaron’s pain came back worse than before, and around midnight again, we checked back into the ER to try and get some answers. I had never seen him in so much pain. Normally, Aaron is a very happy-go-lucky guy, who always has a smile and a laugh to share. He rarely complains and is never sick, so when this took him down, I knew it was serious.

New blood samples were taken, urinalysis done, and the technicians performed an ultrasound to get a better idea of what was happening. Almost immediately they found an anomaly with his gallbladder, and he was admitted to the hospital that night.

They found bilirubin in his urine, which was leaking from his gallbladder into his system. They also proceeded with an MRI, but it wasn’t a simple fix. They informed us almost immediately that they were going to have to do an emergency surgery and remove his gallbladder.

They removed it yesterday, but found that it wasn’t just infected but literally dead. Aaron’s gallbladder had gangrene and had been rotting inside his abdomen.

The surgeon and his team removed the gallbladder and patched him up, inserted a drain hose into his abdomen and they’re currently pumping antibiotics into his IV to fight off the rest of the infection.

Ever since, we’ve been in the hospital room, waiting for some news about when we can leave, but every day we wait, and every drug Aaron is given adds to the already insane medical bill we’ve accrued.

Aaron doesn’t have medical insurance, so the staggering cost of this treatment is too much for him to handle on his own, so I’m reaching out to anyone who can help. Even something as simple as a dollar will help him following his release from the hospital.

All the funds will be used to help pay the medical bill and towards Aaron’s medication and recovery for the next week or two.

The situation continues to change by the hour, so I’ll keep you updated as I can .

Molly