For Medical Treatment

My lung doctor looked at me and said,"You need a lung transplant. But you can't get one because

of your age. You better try to find one of those trials and see if you can get into one."

Guess what? There is not a lot out there for bronchiectasis and even less when your age is 81.

I'm told my lungs have deteriorated, about 39 per cent volume left. Started out at 5L and now I'm

8Liters. And with less air comes inability to walk too far, stand on your feet too long, and flimsy,

wobbly legs, random shortness of breath because of inhaled medicine with steroids and their damaging side effects like glaucoma and tending toward other major health issues.

I never smoked. I guess it was those chemicals in the dark room where I used to pump out photographs for work til 2 or 3 am or the smell of that lead cooking for the linotype machines at

the newspaper. And all those times I had pneumonia. Then the air bag smoke in 2018 put me into oxygen use. Then there was the tissue eating bacteria that did the most damage. Who knows

where that came from but it was working for a long time. I only knew that I shouldn't get worse and try to stay out of the hosopital.

I accompanied an older brother through the last few years of his life. He was healthy, except for eyesite and a missing hip. The only eye he had left had macular degeneration. The missing hip was the result of being pushed down by a resident that broke his leg. It was rebroken two more times. The bone was then lashed to a steel rod that proved to be alergenic. Numerous surgeries later it was removed leaving him with a wheel chair in a nursing home. He chose to stop eating. He was 80 when he died.

Then I accompanied a younger sister with special needs through the last 3 or 4 years of her life. She was 74 and had survived covid despite having all the problems that increased morbity rate. A year or so later, she had pneumonia and three months later died in Oct. 2022. And I am 80.

The only thing that can help my situation is supposed to be stem cells. mesenchymal. It is those specifically that do the best work in the tissue but not as good when there is a lot of damage.

Stem cells are not cheap. If I saved my Social Security Checks for a year or two, I might not have enough to pay for a treatment in some places.

Let me tell you, when you don't have air, you can do very little. I require 8L. Many people after covid are on 2L and 3L. The problem with 8 or more is that you have to double the concentrators at home for your 24/7 air. When I go out, I rig two sources, my Inogen (as seen on TV) and a tank on a cart and I wear two cannulas, because one is pulse and one continuous flow. It limits what you can do.

And that's not all. I can't fly because I use a tank. Now I've got to figure out how many tanks I need to get there and what size vehicle I will have to have to get all the tanks back.

Those administering the treatment can't tell you how many doses might be required to take care of the problem but they like to tell you of the miraculous outcomes. I like to hear them too. And the more it is used, the more they learn and it is being used on more and more ailments and diseases successfully. Based on my own "miraculous experience", I will use every means possible to tell others about it.

After all the stories I've written, pictures I've made and videos I've produced to help people and organizations raise funds for their cause, I find myself in that situation for me. It's hard. But as my daddy used to say, " you only pass through here once." Now I have a few things in the can that I would like to finish but I might find a 70 or 80 year old who may need assistance.