Need Assistance with Bills from Gallbladder Surgery

On April 6, 2025, I woke up at around 4 AM with debilitating stomach pain. This wasn't outside of the norm for me, as this is something that I've been dealing with for the past three years. However, this pain was even more intense and wasn't letting up despite medicine and rest - tricks that had worked for me in the past. I then became aware of the fact that my pain had shifted to my right upper abdomen, just beneath my ribs. I had an ultrasound over a year ago that found that I had gallstones, but my gallbladder wasn't inflamed at that time. I knew that with this pain, this was no longer the case. After 12 hours of agony, I finally took myself to urgent care. One ER referral and hours worth of tests later, my suspicions were confirmed: my gallbladder had become severely inflamed and needed to be removed as soon as possible.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to receive surgery until April 8th due to a lack of openings. During this time, I stayed two full days in the hospital, fasting almost the entire time and taking regularly scheduled medication to stave off the pain. I was luckily able to go home not too long after my surgery, where I spent a week resting and recovering. I'm happy to report that since April, I have no longer felt any sort of debilitating stomach pain and can eat whatever I want without triggering an episode. I'm slowly working my way off of acid reflux medicine and have never felt better after three years of chronic pain.

Unfortunately, extended surgery and hospital stays are expensive. My total bill is over $4,000. While I have a monthly payment plan for my hospital services, which is about a third of the total, I am unable to set up a payment plan for the physician/surgery services without paying - at minimum - 15% of the total bill up front (around $430). I have about two more months before this 2/3 of the bill goes into collections.

For the past three months, I have been the only income earner in my household. I feel like I'm barely treading water as is with my regular monthly expenses. To have such a large debt in need of quick repayment hanging over my head is devastating.

All proceeds from this GoFundMe will go to help paying my medical expenses as I try to make payments when I can. Any donations are greatly appreciated, as well as shares in lieu of monetary assistance. Your help is invaluable.