Jason & Stephanie's medical

I am telling the story of my little brother Jason Blais because I have tried to be his voice over the last 4 years.  To all that know, him Jason has been fighting the battle of his life against stage 4 cancer of the larynx that  left him with limited ability to speak.  He was diagnosed by chance as he was beeing seen by the Dr. for an "respiratory infection" and what we thought would end with a perscription for a Z pack.  How his life changed that day and the lives of our family.  Jason went through extreme chemo treatment and extensive radiation with every horrific side effect that you could imagine.  He made it through by the grace of God and  with prayers and the support of friends and family.  Jason had bounced back as best he could and returned to work until about a year ago.  You see, the side effect of radiation is excessive scar tissue.  Over the last 2 years, the scar tissue became so dense inside of  his throat that he was breathing through a 3 mm airway (the size inside of a coffee straw).  This left him gasping for air on a daily basis and resulted in tremendous weight loss. (160lbs at 6ft 6in)  He became unable to work due to the fact that he had difficulty breathing with minimal  exhertion.  This has caused an extreme hardship on Jason and his family- Stephanie and 8 year old son.   After seeing several ENT physicians, we had to accept the fact that a trachostomy was his only hope as he wasn't able to get enough air in  and to release the carbon dioxide building in his lungs.  Jason had his trachostomy last month and was doing well until he began to spew blood from his trach.  In actuality, he lost almost 1 liter of blood and he is in the process of testing to find the source.  We continue to pray and hold fast in our faith for healing.  I ask for help for a person that has lent a helping hand to so many others throughout the years so that he can focus on treatment and healing.

Signed Jason's loving sister,

Shelley Barreca