Emergency surgery and financial help

Hi! I’m Jessica Kline Geiger and I am fundraising on behalf of Damar Gray his mom, Lisa Kline. Damar had his first major brain surgery at the age of 3. He was born with a Arteriovenous malformation (AVM) where basically a lot of blood vessels in his brain wrapped together to form almost a rubber band ball. During the surgery his doctor/surgeon would need to unravel those blood vessels to get blood flow to the major parts of his brain. It was a 13 hour long surgery with only a 12% chance of living. The surgery was a success, but caused damage to cerebellum dealing with moter functions, left eye blindness, hearing loss, and hydrocephalus. Since then he has around 28 surgeries with many ER visits for infections.

August 21, 2021 he was rushed to the ER with massive headaches and speech delay. His shunt in his brain had become clogged and they needed to replace it right away. After putting in the new shunt, he developed a fever, but the hospital still sent him home a day later thinking the labs had become decontaminated and he would be fine.

August 23, 2021, the next day after release, Damar was rushed back to the ER with head swelling and massive headaches. His new shunt was failing and an infection was spreading. Doctors rushed him back again for another emergency brain surgery where they had to take the new shunt out and put in an external one trying to figure out what kind of infection he has in his brain. In doing so, they found that the part of the shunt that goes into his abdomen had broke. To remove, they had to make an incision in his neck to pull out part of the shunt and an incision in his abdomen to remove the remaining piece, where they also found another infection.

At this moment, Damar and his mom are in a room at Children’s of Alabama in Birmingham awaiting test results to find out what kind of infection is spreading through his system. Until the infection is cleared, he will remain on a external shunt and in the hospital, and then doctors can perform another surgery to put a new shunt back into his body. Doctors are now trying to decide if they can place a new shunt in the same area or if it needs to be moved to the other side of his head, which means more drilling, another plate on his skull, and more incisions on his body.

While this is happening, Lisa Kline, his mom, is not sure how much she is going to be able to work. She doesn’t have any savings and she is on her last couple of dollars. Damar’s food will be provided, but hers will not. She is already trying to figure out how she will be able to pay bills this month, let alone be able to eat throughout the day. There is a food program at Children’s of Alabama, but she does not qualify because it’s based on how many miles you live from the hospital. Since he needs his doctors close, they’ve always had to be near the hospital, rendering this program out of her grasp.

If you can find it in your heart to donate to them, then they would be forever grateful and appreciative. She is just a single mother trying to raise her son, keep him healthy, and keep a roof over their heads. Even if they get out of the hospital soon, he will not be able to be left alone for awhile during his recovery and there is still a chance this new shunt could fail, which would make it even harder.

If you can’t donate, we would appreciate a share of this fundraiser, but more importantly we need prayers from everyone. Thank you so much for taking your time to read this and I hope you are your family many blessings.