Raven's Road to Revival

Raven is a loving 28 year old single mother with an energetic 5 year old son named William. On October 14, 2022, her life was flipped upside down when Doctor's informed her she had Cancer. What started as a normal day with a Dunkin' run before dropping William off at school, quickly became the first chapter in a nightmare when she was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML). Raven fainted in the Dunkin' Donuts Parking lot out of nowhere and she & William were then taken to the hospital in an ambulance. After hours of testing, doctors informed her she possibly had a very rare type of cancer and would need to begin treatment right away at a Hospital that is equipped to treat her. Raven was transferred that night to a hospital nearly 3 hours away from home. There was no time for her to process anything and no time to prepare William for the reality that mommy was going to be away for a long time.

Currently, there is no cure for AML, the deadliest of all Leukemias. Treatment is still experimental and is more trial & error than it is a clear road from treatment to recovery.

Raven spent 4 weeks after that incident undergoing 5 rounds of chemo just to get her body to a "stable" place so they could perform a bone marrow transplant. Unfortunately, her sister and parents were not suitable donor matches. Due to the very aggressive nature of AML, there wasn't time to wait on the bone marrow list. So Doctors turned to stem cells. She received a stem cell transplant in early January, however, this is just the beginning of the next chapter in her road to recovery. She is being closely monitored for the next 100 days but the list of things that can go wrong is overwhelming. After getting past that benchmark the list gets significantly shorter and the hope is she will then be able to return home and be reunited with William. We don't know what comes next at this point since all of this is still very experimental. The Doctors are careful to remind us that this is just another hurdle and there will be more along the way.

It is unclear when Raven will be able to return and she has not earned any income since October. Family is helping the best they can, but medical bills, expenses for treatment, travel, and typical living expenses add up very quickly. Raven recently purchased her first home in May 2022 and was only able to live in it for 6 months before having to move into a little hospital room. In addition to all of this, Raven also has a 5-year-old son to provide for. Because of his age, William is not allowed to visit her at the hospital so for the next 4 months he can only see his mom via facetime.

Once Raven is released from the hospital, she will be moved to a nearby apartment where a family member must be present with her for approximately 3 months raising yet more challenges. The transplant center is for patients who live too far away for this phase of treatment as it requires daily appointments and therefore will require her Parents to miss time from work to split covering the 24/7 care she needs.

The funds received are to help cover Raven's medical and housing expenses, and assist the family members with expenses incurred for covering her 24/7 care as well as care for William while she is receiving treatment.