Ajay and Her Tumor are Breaking Up!

Howdy friends, and thank you for considering my cause!! My name is Ajay Russell, I am 32 years old and recently received a life altering diagnosis. After a long and drawn out history with some medical issues, I finally stopped ignoring them and sought help from a Doctor. After reviewing my symptoms, I was referred to an endocrinologist to dig deeper. After months of being poked, prodded, scanned, peeing in gallon jugs, saliva swabs at midnight, a hundred blood draws, I finally received my diagnosis. In May of 2017 I was officially diagnosed with an extremely rare condition known as Cushings disease. It affects about one out of every million people per year. If left untreated, the mortality rate is 50% after five years. As you can imagine, this is a terrifying thing to hear. I then learned there are two general types of the disease, one that stems from a tumor on your pituitary gland and one that stems from a tumor on your adrenal gland. After several scans of my brain and lots of testing, we ruled out the brain tumor..:::phew::::..But the end result is that I have a tumor.on my adrenal gland. I have been put in touch with a specialist in Orlando who I am seeing at the end of the month to schedule surgery for removal of the tumor. Even with insurance, I got the big blow to the chest, my out of pocket responsibility is right at $6,000!! Even worse, they require it up front. Those who know me know that I make a fairly decent living, but I do not have nearly this type of money at my disposal. And in addition, I will have to miss several weeks of work, travel to Orlando multiple times as well as a several night hospital stay at Flagler Hospital in St Augustine for my surgery. Getting that call was highly overwhelming, but my determination to get what is estimated to be a 5-10 year old tumor out of my body is strong and unrelenting. I have always been the care giver, the one throwing fundraisers for others, so this is definitely not one of my most proudest moments, but I'm not too proud to admit that I need a little help to make this happen. I like to think I've put a lot of good juju and karma out into the universe and have done a whole lot of good for a whole lot of people and animals over the years that I am hopeful it will come back to me now, when I need it the most. Thanks for listening!!!