Hi, this sounds like a made-for-TV movie. But truth be told, this is a real-life horror that my wife of 38 years and I are going through.

My wife Vivianna was so ill, we thought it was the tail end of the flu that she was getting over as we all were. Between Feb 27th and March 1st, she could not get out of bed. She had a massive migraine headache, fever, and could not handle lights or sound.

I was really worried when she could not comprehend anything or recognize who I was. I had my oldest son go check on her, and he said to me, "Dad, I'm calling an ambulance, this is not normal."

Paramedics were here within a minute, and after assessing her, the decision was made to bring her to Elmhurst Hospital.

They ran all the necessary tests to see what was wrong. A C/T scan revealed a dark abstract on her brain. Elmhurst Dr. advised us to bring her to Loyola Hospital, which was just a couple of miles up the road as they were a Trauma Center.

Once the transfer was made, additional tests were performed. They located 2 more dark spots, cheekbone area by her ears.

The decision was made to perform emergency brain surgery to remove all of the abstract. Because of the nature of this life-saving surgery and my wife really struggling to breathe, they put her in a medically induced coma.

So that's the first part of this traumatic real-life story. I'm Geo Martinez, husband to my beautiful wife Vivianna. Now comes my turn!

On March 2nd, during one of our visits to see my wife, who is still in a coma, I was saying goodnight to her and moved a chair out of the way. I felt some discomfort in my right leg. We went home, and I thought little of it.

Overnight, my right knee seemed to get three times the size of my left knee, and it was very painful. After visiting with my wife, my son brought me down to the emergency room.

I got treated, looked at, and had X-rays taken. I was told to follow up the following week with an orthopedic doctor as they thought maybe I snapped an ACL or had a meniscus tear. So we go home with not the best news on my leg. At this point, nothing is more important than my wife getting better.

However, that evening I felt so sick, I had a fever of 104.5, and my leg was so hot to the touch and very dull feeling. My oldest son brings me back to the emergency room.

This time I gave them more information about myself and what my wife was going through in the same hospital. I have type 2 diabetes and have had multiple knee surgeries on my left leg and seven back surgeries, with the most recent one being in July of 2025. So I basically let them know that I had so much hardware in my body and that I was under so much stress, which is not good for my diabetes because of what was happening with my wife.

This time they used an ultrasound machine and noticed that I had lots of fluids in my leg. They drained a lot of it out there in the emergency room. The doctor came back and said to me that my ordeal was not over and that I needed life-saving surgery as I had a major infection in my leg. The surgery was successful; they were able to get all the disease out of my leg. The infectious disease team informed me that I would need to spend some time in the hospital so they could see what this truly was but also to see if it was anything similar to what my wife was going through.

Ultimately, I spent a week in the hospital, and after so many tests and so many antibiotics taken, the infectious disease team said that I had a staph septic arthritis infection. I was able to go home after 10 days. But because of the severity of the disease, I have aftercare treatment such as a nurse for administering all the antibiotics through an IV and a physical therapist here at home several times a week.

So during all this, my wife is still in the hospital, but she is off the respirator and out of the medically induced coma. We all truly miss having her home, but she did have a severe life-changing event happen to her. The disease she had was named 'streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis.' Most likely, she had a bad ear infection. The doctor stated that her skull was very soft in several locations. These were the paths of how the disease got in her brain.

As of March 15th, she is now in a nursing home. My Vivi is very strong but does require a lot of help because of the brain surgery she had. The facility will keep her safe and is going to help her with her cognitive and motor skills. Anyone that knows my wife Vivianna knows that she is a very tough cookie and will certainly overcome all this and get healthy enough to come home.

My daughter Reina Martinez is a rockstar. My poor baby has put her life on hold to help care for both of us and has temporarily moved in with us. I know this is an emotional and financial burden for her. My 2 sons are also helping out so much. Thank you, God, for blessing us; we both could have died. One more sad part to this story, my daughter's beloved puppy passed away during all of this. Her name is Luna, she is a boxer who was only 8 years old, and like her mom, she was a tough cookie.

I never thought I would have to reach out via a GoFundMe to ask for financial assistance. At the time of all this, my wife was already disabled and on Social Security disability income. I was let go from my job as the company closed two years ago. Any savings that we had were all consumed during these last two years; it has been very tough finding work.

The assistance that we are seeking is to pay for medical bills, the post-hospital nursing care, and to help put food on the table.

The other side of the story is just to make people aware of things that can happen with your body. If something doesn't seem right, go to the emergency room, listen to that family member, and really follow your gut when you think something is just not right with your body.