Help Dariusz's fight with Leukemia

Hi,

 

My name is Agata, I am Darek's big sister. Darek has been suddenly diagnosed with Leukemia on 9/13 at Swedish American Emergency Room in Rockford, IL. That same day he has been transferred to UW Madison for higher level of care and management of the disease.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About Darek:

My little brother, always healthy and full of life. Putting the needs of others before his own. Serving his communities as a Firefighter/EMT in the Northern Illinois Region. He has worked so hard to finish his paramedic training just to have his career dreams crushed by this disease. He has been going to Swedish American Paramedic Program at the same time as attending the Fire Academy. He has been advocating for local Stillman Valley High School - Meridian Community School Dist 223, and rest of the community through his passion of video production. Thanks to his video production efforts, it helped save sport atheltics and extracurricular activities after school. Darek also donated his video production talents to assist in providing 24/7 staffing of emergency personnel at the Stillman Fire.

He treats everyone like family and drops everything immediately to help someone in need. That is my little brother.

 

We will appreciate any donation you can make. The Hospital bills will be in the thousands of dollars. Let's try to help Darek not to have to worry about money, He has enough on his mind. It is not easy going through a cancer diagnosis at age 21 when you have a vision for life that now seems like it will never happen.

 

Darek is currently 21 years old and very healthy until few months ago when he started experiencing leg muscle injuries without evident cause. The injuries healed on their own, except the last one that was not going away and Darek went to see a doctor. He has also experienced 20lb weight loss but attributed it to stress. Over the next few days, he started to experience more symptoms such as ear pain, ringing in ears, and blurry vision. Intense headaches followed shortly after with episodes of dizziness, loss of balance, vomiting every 20 minutes, total hearing loss in right ear and complete vision loss in right eye. The primary doctor ordered MRI head which came back normal except small mastoid infection on the right side by the ear. The blood work showed elevated White Blood Cells - 750,000 ( normal range 4,500 - 11,000). It also showed showed severe anemia with hemoglobin at 7.3 ( normal range 13.6 - 17.7, blood transfusion is required below 7). We headed to the emergency room right away. More blood work, more episodes of vomiting and severe headache that is unable to be controlled with narcotics. Whole body CT scan to rule out blood clots ( his blood was very thick due to very high levels of White Blood Cells). The CT scan also showed very enlarged spleen ( normal spleen is the size of a fist, his was extending from his lungs down to his pelvis). After several hours, symptoms are slightly more controlled just in time for ambulance transfer to UW Madison.

The oncology team at UW has been nothing short of amazing. They are taking great care of Darek. The bone biopsy further confirmed Chronic Myeloid Leukemia. Darek was immediately started on a chemotherapy drug to decrease the high levels of white blood cells in his body to help ease the painful symptoms.

 

The funds from this fundraiser will be used to pay for:

 

 

UPDATE 9/17

Darek is still at UW hospital - day 5. The double dose chemotherapy drugs seem to be working - the white blood counts went down from 750,000 to 329,000. That's great news! However, the same chemotherapy drugs are causing side effects such as arm and leg pain with swelling and weakness. Darek is still too weak to get out of bed or walk on his own. He has stopped vomiting 2 days ago and is eating more. The vision loss in right eye and hearing loss in right ear has not resolved yet. Darek is very thankful for all the support he has already received from family and friends. And I believe it will be critical for him to have strong support around him as we continue this life long fight.