Help Bruce DeLaney Fight Esophageal Cancer

Hello. My name is Bruce DeLaney. I am, except for one issue, a healthy 77-year-old retired stone mason. I am also a retired skydiving instructor with approximately 6,000 skydives and, as such, have traveled this country, following the sun. I am the father of 2 lovely daughters and have lived an active life.

I have recently been diagnosed with stage 3 esophageal cancer. I live in the United States and so, consequently, the only treatment that my insurance will cover is chemotherapy and/or radiation. Because of the type of cancer that I have and its location, neither of those therapies would be effective and, in fact, would likely be lethal. There are other curatives available in America but not covered by my health insurance. The cost of such therapy here would begin at $150,000 which is unaffordable.

There is, however, a clinic in South America that provides such treatments effectively for much less. I am interested in obtaining treatment at Mountains of Hope, a clinic in Colombia, SA. The cost there, for a very comprehensive, 4-week-long treatment, would be $30,000. This would include airfare and some few extra items that are not included in their fee.

I received this stage 3 diagnosis on December 24, 2024, 4 months ago and, although I have not been re-examined since, I seem to have gotten worse in the last month or so. It is difficult to eat now as there is a lesion at the top of my esophagus and it is painful to swallow. I weighed 165 lbs. back in December and am now down to 108 lbs, so a loss of 57 lbs. That seems like a lot for 4 months so, perhaps this cancer is moving rapidly.

As I said, I am retired from masonry construction and retired also from being a skydiving instructor but being retired does not mean that I'm prepared to sit quietly and do nothing. I am now in the process of writing 2 different literary projects. One is a novel of the Literary Fiction genre and the other is a series of poems, nineteen in all, that I have written over the years, now presenting them with a few paragraphs of prose, hopefully engaging prose, to introduce each poem. I don't know of any other book of poetry presented this way but others who have had a glimpse at it have given me promising reviews.

It is my hope to survive this cancer and be able to finish these projects and, if good fortune should find me, write more. I hope that you might find this life worth saving for, at least, a bit longer so that I might have the time to complete these projects and perhaps a few more.

Thank you for taking the time to read my request.

Sincerely,

Bruce DeLaney