Marlon's Mission

Hi! My name is Sarah, Cristina and Marlon are close friends of mine so I wanted to create a gofundme to support them during this trying time. Here is their story -

Marlon Cortorreal is a healthy 36 year old man born and raised in Jersey City, NJ. Later on in his 20’s, he moved to South Philadelphia.

He met his fiance Cristina in the spring of 2021 and shortly after, they moved in together in Doylestown, PA. In the summer of 2022, they got engaged, and about 3 weeks later, they found out they were having their first child together. Unfortunately, while they were planning for the best and newest addition to their lives, Cristina found out at 20 weeks pregnant, she had suffered a miscarriage. While trying to grieve the loss of their daughter and trying to find happiness during the holiday season, they started the process of planning a wedding.

Then, about 2 months after their loss, Cristina found out they were expecting again. They felt all the emotions; overjoyed, nervous, excited, scared, happy and anxious. In October of 2023, they finally welcomed a healthy baby boy, Leo John. Life went on with raising their baby boy and everything was all right in the world.

Until June of 2024. Marlon randomly started to have flu-like symptoms for about 2 or 3 weeks. Fevers, body aches, low energy and random bruising on his body. He went to Urgent Care to see if there was anything wrong with him. Marlon tested negative for Covid, flu and strep and they were left with no answers. They were stunned the rest of the day. The very next morning, Marlon started coughing up blood and he of course went to Doylestown ER. There, they ran all kinds of tests and scans. Low and behold, due to his blood tests coming back severely low, they got hit with the worst news they could ever imagine.

“Marlon, your blood results are coming back with a clear indication of Leukemia.”

This was a stab in the gut for them. Doylestown immediately transferred Marlon to UPenn and handed his case right over to their oncology team. The next day, tests came back that his diagnosis was APML. Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia. They were told that this kind of Leukemia was highly curable and it had a pretty high survival rate. A huge weight was lifted off their shoulders, until they were told that Marlon had to be inpatient for a month. This was devastating to Marlon because that meant had to be away from their 9 month old baby and his fiance Cristina. But, as per Doctor’s orders, Marlon of course accepted the chemotherapy treatment and did what he had to do to fight this cancer. Cristina is now left with taking care of all the bills, while single parenting, while running a business and a household. Marlon has been out of work since the diagnosis. Not only being out of work from his full time job, but also his side job which is being a DJ and being booked every Thursday night, Friday night and Saturday night.

28 days later, after his first round of chemotherapy, he got the best news. His treatment worked and that he was in remission and he was finally able to come home to his family. His preventative care insists of outpatient, IV infusions through his PICC line. He now has to drive to Center city Philadelphia everyday, Monday through Friday, every other month. He is still receiving the same chemotherapy treatment as he was when he was inpatient. This means no work for Marlon. This also means Cristina is left to handle all the household bills and daycare expenses on her own. Not only do they have those bills coming in, but also all of Marlon’s medical bills. Cristina is actually still paying off her medical bills from when she lost her first baby. They went from sitting comfortably, down to only one income.

Please join us for a Beef and Beer on Sunday September 15th to raise money to help with their outstanding medical bills and financial hardship. The day will be filled with food, games and music!