Hello! This is the new channel for accepting donations for D. Foy's ongoing needs. The original fundraiser, which tells his whole story, is here: https://gofund.me/f46da2b74

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(Update 6/10. Scroll down for earlier info.)

6/10/26

To contribute, use this link: https://gofund.me/f7e840fa7

Dear friends,

Thank you again—truly, deeply: thank you--to everyone who has contributed, shared, and sent loving messages and suggestions. All of it is seen and felt.

Following up on Matt’s last update, I’ll start with the REALLY GOOD NEWS: D’s nerve ablations are indeed working. His headache has truly diminished for the first time in over 400 days. The ablations have actually reduced the feeling of constant pressure inside his skull. D’s multiple myeloma doctor calls it “proof of concept.” Which means: whether or not these first two nerve ablations fully cure his headache, we definitively know the cause of the pain and how it should be addressed. We watched a movie together with the sound up, something he hasn’t been able to do for a year. In a grocery store, he realized that the music and incidental sounds of carts and chatter—which would have forced him out of the store—didn’t bother him as much. We won’t know for a while the full extent of the success. For now: ***Thank you for helping him get this far.****

ALSO THANKS TO YOUR SUPPORT, just a few things from a long list:

-D has been narrowing down the list of coaches who’ll help him figure out how to handle the material demands of life.

-D has been able to continue renewing a prescription from a compounding pharmacy that is not covered by insurance.

-He’s continued to pay down debt that accumulated during this year of genuine disability.

Unfortunately, there are still issues. He’s having severe neck and shoulder inflammation, especially from the second ablation. Radiofrequency ablation involves purposely creating lesions that interrupt nerve signals. Since the occipital nerves are at the base of the skull, it’s a little hard for D to distinguish what is neck pain and what’s head pain. This aftereffect can last a while, up to three months. Today he will begin a course of prednisone that will—we hope—help with the inflammation.

Another temporary hitch in the progress: The day after the second ablation, D was diagnosed with a large kidney stone and needed a very…. Let’s just use the word “uncomfortable”… and invasive procedure, plus home after-care and convalescence.

Meanwhile, his monthly chemo infusions and other cancer maintenance continue—and will continue for the rest of his life.

Again, this will be slow-going, potentially with months in wait-and-see mode. As positive as things are looking—and they really are!--he can’t leap into action yet. Your help is allowing D to prepare for the next chapter of his life in a conscious, realistic way. You’re making it possible for both of us not to panic. For him not to sink deeper into debt, not to skip crucial care. To shore up strength for reentering the world.

Anything you do will be profoundly appreciated, whether you contribute, share, or simply send us good thoughts (and ideas).

Nelly

PS I’ve been planning an update specifically about D. and work possibilities. It will come soon.

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(Update, 5/18. Scroll down for earlier info.)

Dear friends,

To all who have contributed, shared, and sent love and good thoughts D’s way: Thank you from the bottoms of our hearts. Times are very hard for so many right now–globally, and also among people we know and love. We have friends struggling with serious medical conditions, financial insecurity, and of course all the exigencies of contemporary life, which can feel untenable. Knowing these are your realities, we feel exponentially grateful. You have not only helped D., you’re also helping us–his longtime close circle of support.

Here’s the update on D.’s health:

As I’m typing this, D. is receiving his second nerve ablation. Since the first one seemed to release the pressure on the left side of his head, we’re hopeful that this right-side ablation will do the trick to eliminate much of this brutal 400+-day headache. An after-effect of the ablation is pain and inflammation in the neck, where the nerves get cauterized. That pain can last months. But as D. said to me yesterday, he welcomes neck pain if it means saying goodbye to the headache.

Any treatments that relieve the head pain still don’t–can’t, alas–address the underlying cause: D.’s bones are full of lesions and holes.

Last Monday, he had a new PET scan that showed the large holes in his skull where the cancer ate the bone. For a PET scan, you’re injected with a radioactive tracer ahead of the scan. Last Tuesday—the next day —he had his monthly chemo infusion. Needless to say, he was knocked out by these things (on top of the inflammation from the first ablation and his many daily meds). He still hasn’t completely recovered from the virus he had last month.

That week was typical of D.’s current life: tests, treatments, and then treatments and medications for side effects from other medications and treatments. And a lot of resting when he literally can’t do anything else.

Like we’ve said, it’s been a gradual coming to terms with the fact that D. will never have a normal life. He’ll always have fragile, perforated bones. He’ll always have degenerative disc disease in his spine. He’ll always have increased risks of stroke and clots. He’ll always have a fragile immune system. Still, we’re positive that when the headache is gone, he’ll be able to have an improved quality of life and get back to connecting with community, working, moving his body, and maybe even writing.

In his recent update here, Matt mentioned some of the immediate ways your support is helping.

In addition this week:

-D. will be able to get an expensive topical antiinflammatory medicine (prescription-only) not covered by our insurance.

-He is paying his credit card bills, and has begun reducing his debt.

-His transportation costs have been covered.

-He’s begun working on a path to being employed–within the bounds of his new normal. (More on that soon)

-He has peace of mind to focus on ending the headache.

As always: if you can contribute toward D.’s recovery from this lengthy period of incapacitating pain, we would be so grateful.Whether or not you’re able to contribute, please consider sharing the fundraiser.

With so much appreciation, truly,

Nelly

PS. I’m going to tell you something personal now (my friends know how bad I am at sharing my deepest feelings): one reason that it’s so hard to ask you for help is that I very much wish I could do everything myself. If I could just take care of all of D. 's needs, I would do it in a heartbeat. Reaching out to you is what we’re doing instead. You’ve shown up for us. Thank you, everyone. (And to the angels reading this who’ve gone above and beyond: we know you’re there.)

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Update 5/7--Scroll down for earlier info.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to D. Foy’s fundraiser. Your generosity has brought him real relief during a very difficult stretch, and it means a great deal.

Nelly has done the heavy lifting organizing this campaign and has done a wonderful job getting the message out. My name is Matt Binder, and I’ve been helping where I can. D. is a longtime friend and writing mentor. We met about a decade ago after I read his novel PATRICIDE and sent him an unsolicited fan email. Since then, he’s edited three of my novels and become one of my closest friends.

The big update this week: D. has undergone his first radiofrequency ablation procedure. As we’ve shared, this is typically a last-resort treatment when other pain management options haven’t worked. In simple terms, the procedure targets and cauterizes the nerves in his neck that are sending pain signals to the brain.

The treatment takes place over several days. Last week, doctors completed two sessions, addressing the nerves on one side of his neck.

We’re very encouraged by the results so far. This is the most significant improvement D. has experienced in over a year. One side of his head is already feeling real relief. He said that, considering he had pneumonia just before the headaches began, this is the best he has felt since December 2024.

Next, he needs clearance to treat the other occipital nerve. We’re hopeful that can happen next week.

The procedure itself is grueling and causes pain at the treatment sites, so for now D. is resting and recovering.

Nelly mentioned that we would share a few immediate, tangible ways your support is helping.

Here are a few:

• D. will be able to get a custom orthopedic lift. Due to nerve damage, his right leg is shorter than his left. This imbalance is causing pain in his knees (both of which have been replaced) and in his hips, where there is significant bone damage.

• He will be able to begin paying down some of the substantial credit card debt he’s taken on to cover medical and basic living expenses while unable to work.

• He will be able to start working with a physical therapist who specializes in rehabilitation for complex bone conditions. Because of the damage to his bones, building strength safely is essential—but he hasn’t been able to exercise for over a year, and the risk of fractures is high.

Right now, the focus is stabilizing D. and helping him regain strength and mobility. We’ll continue to share updates as next steps come into focus.

Thank you again for your consideration and generous support.

Sincerely,

Matt

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UPDATE 4/25/26

Dear all of you,

First, again: we send you heartfelt thanks–those who have donated, those who have shared, and those who have simply just read and acknowledged what’s been happening with D. Even giving attention to someone else’s hardship is not always easy, we know.

Here’s something that Matt wrote that really hit me: “In March 2020, the world shut down. Most of us eventually returned to our lives. My friend D. Foy never did.” It's so true: because of his compromised immune system and other physical fragilities, D. is living with the kind of constant isolation and high stakes that we all experienced during the worst days of the pandemic

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We said that in the next update, we would get into some nitty-gritty details about what we think is going on with D’s headache, and next treatment steps.

In 2019, he had a second surgery on his neck—his first was in 2015. This one was supposed to be a disc replacement in his cervical spine. During the surgery, a vertebra crumbled, and the surgeon had to improvise by putting in a spacer—not to help support vertebrae as is usual, but to totally replace the crumbled bone. Now we know that the bone was that fragile because D. was already suffering from full-blown multiple myeloma. During this surgery, there was also unexpected and excessive bleeding that made it hard for the surgeon to execute this emergency strategic switch. Instead of going home the next day, as planned, D. wound up in the ICU and had an unexpected hospital stay. After that, he had terrible headaches on and off. And his neck never felt the same. The vertebrae around the spacer continued to get weaker as his bone marrow cancer progressed, undiagnosed.

Medical consensus is that the cumulative stress on his spine finally reached critical mass last March, when his current headache blossomed and never left. The headache is not a migraine, nor a medication overuse headache, nor related to jaw tension. He’s followed protocols for all of these with no change at all. The only treatment that has helped a bit, temporarily (other than his daily pain meds, which dull the sensation) is steroid injections in his cervical spine.

The next step is radio frequency nerve ablation (RFA). This is targeted nerve damage to stop the pain signals from the nerve to the brain.

THANKS TO YOUR SUPPORT, between our previous post and now, D. has secured an appointment for his first RFA procedure. It will happen over two days next week, April 29th and 30th. We’re really hopeful that this will work. The wild card–if it works–is how many times he’ll have to get this procedure to fully eliminate his headache. Needless to say, even dropping to level 3 pain from his current headache would be an immediate relief. (His birthday is April 27th, and a lessening of his pain would be an amazing birthday present.) We’ve met one person whose headaches were completely cured after six RFA treatments over a couple of years. So, for D. this could be quick or it could take some time. After RFA, there’s often a period of worsening pain before it gets better. We won’t know right away. We will update you soon after the procedure.

I’ll also write again soon with more details about how you are already helping, and more about what the assistance will be used for.

Finally: we really understand—and empathize—if you can’t pitch in materially right now. We know how that is. If you can share the link to this fundraiser, especially with a few words of your own, that would be a gift, too.

Gratefully,

Nelly (and the team)

4/19/26

Greetings, friends, family, and supporters of D. Foy.

We have debated doing this for many months. And it was really hard for D. to agree to it. After all, we promised we would end this GoFundMe campaign. It’s been closed to donations for years.

You have all already helped so much. Your support got D. from the shock of being diagnosed with late-stage bone marrow cancer through his chemo treatments and stem cell transplant, and then as well through a very difficult year of recovery. And you made it possible for Nelly to be there for him. Thanks to you and his doctors, he was beginning to get back on his feet.

So: it’s really hard to tell you that D. has not been doing well for a while. In spite of our optimism, he never bounced back from many years of living with undiagnosed bone marrow cancer, nor from the effects of the stem cell transplant.

What we hadn’t learned at the beginning was that even in the best case scenario, most people who reach the late stages of Multiple Myeloma never get back to “normal.” Most patients that we’ve met, in fact, suffer from lifelong pain, fatigue, and fragility. At this point, years of oral chemotherapy and the still-ongoing chemo infusions that keep his cancer at bay have wreaked havoc on his immune system, which was already damaged by the illness. He’s had pneumonia multiple times. (He’s sick in bed as we write this.) Small wounds don’t heal and become infected. A couple of these local infections have spread frighteningly quickly. He’s had two more stroke events (TIA’s). He has chronic kidney stones. He will need orthopedic surgeries. This is all directly related to his being a Multiple Myeloma patient.

The many large lesions and holes throughout his skeleton are a permanent fact of life.

Why This Moment?

The reason we’re moved to reopen this space now is that for over a year, D. has suffered from a crushing headache, 24/7. Friends, we’re not talking about a series of headaches—we’re talking about one single headache for 392 days. He goes to sleep in pain and wakes up in pain. He describes it as intense pressure on the inside of his skull, the feeling that his head will explode. Loud noises are crippling and can send him to bed for days. (For the grunge nostalgists among you, the one upside is that he now has awesomely long hair—haircuts cause the headache to spike.)

So, on top of his monthly chemo days, he’s spent much of the last year receiving a range of procedures at three different facilities, including the Mayo Clinic—from two rounds of spinal steroid injections, four rounds of medical Botox, two occipital nerve blocks, and trigger point injections, to a spinal tap and Emgality injections. He has also been prescribed a ridiculously long list of medications.

While none of the interventions have stopped the pain, they have ruled out potential causes. Through this process of elimination, his doctors now suspect that a compound of disc deterioration and bone spurs, and myeloma lesions and holes throughout his cervical spine and skull have increasingly inflamed the nerves that send pain signals from the spine to the brain.

This knowledge means there is hope.

There’s a gameplan for next treatment steps. We’ll tell you about it in the next (shorter!) post.

Despite everything, D. has remained committed to being self-sufficient. Amazingly, he has continued to work when he can, as a freelance editor and writing coach. But at this moment, his ability is limited.

Matt, Matt’s family—and Nelly, of course, always—have been helping and supporting D. in every way we can.

But we humbly ask you to join in helping him again.

Here’s what you will be helping with right now:

-Medical expenses–providers, treatments, equipment, and medicines not covered by insurance; copays for the appointments that are covered; transportation to and from medical appointments.

-Basic living expenses, from the everyday to the unexpected.

-Creditors–unfortunately, he has had to rely on credit cards to cover medical and living expenses. He has no immediate way of paying the bills.

It’s been a heartbreaking time for we who love D. The pressures, limitations, and necessary isolation caused by his illness have refracted into his closest relationships and have changed the shape of his family.

And we know this is a difficult time for so many of you. The whole world is in rough shape.

Still, if you were able to help our beloved D. Foy, his–and our–gratitude would know no bounds. Anything you can contribute will be appreciated, deeply.

The aim: create a bridge for D. until his headache abates, and he regains his footing. We are setting a new 12K goal. When he stabilizes, we will close the fundraiser again. D. is insistent that this campaign be as brief as possible. Hopefully this is one of very few updates. We just want to get D. to the point where his pain is gone–or at least manageable enough–to get back to work.

Thank you so much—

Nelly (partner/longtime sweetheart)

Matt (might-as-well-be-D’s-brother)

P.S. If D. were writing this, he’d say he’s okay with things. He’s been meditating a lot. He feels a kind of peace. Believe it or not, he even has a sense of humor.

P.P.S. Nelly’s material situation is the same as before: lucky to be a longtime faculty member at Sarah Lawrence College, Nelly still just has year-to-year contracts and no retirement fund. We are so grateful to the whole SLC community for its support. Nelly is also fortunate, right now, to have freelance work–but it is on a month-to-month basis.