Support Barbara's Fight Against Liver Cancer

Hello, everyone. My name is Shannon Higgins Francis. This story isn’t about me, but about my mom (Barbara Higgins) who has recently been diagnosed with liver cancer. For years she only had cirrhosis, something she battled tirelessly for 6-8 years, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough and cancerous lesions formed.

Currently my wife and I are doing all we can to help support my mom and younger sister. My sister unfortunately is mentally disabled, and can only help so much.

My mom has a chemotherapy session coming up on I believe the 6th of November, after that we have to wait 3 grueling long months to see if the chemo even took effect. If it didn’t, it’s up to my mom if she will want to complete another round or not, and unfortunately the only other choice is a liver transplant, and waiting for a matching donor is..well this is why I’m making a GoFundMe.

All my mom wants is to see her family one last time before she gets sicker. I have a TikTok video I’ve yet to edit that says just about as much. I really would love to make this a reality above anything for her. I am disabled, but I have one respite care job and I also stream video gaming on Tik Tok, currently all gifts on there are going towards her care, as little as it may be. My wife unfortunately has their own sick mom to take care of as well, and without getting too personal it’s the sickness of the same coin, just located in different places. We put every resource we have together to make sure everyone’s needs are met.

I’m not sure how much a family reunion would cost, but my starting goal is going to be 2K. I am hoping to meet AND exceed that, I can only hope atleast

A little bit about my mom

Name: Barbara Ann (Galbraith) Higgins

She was born in New York, and lived on Long Island, among many other places. She was a tough kiddo, always playing sports and standing up for her siblings..but also dealing out a sibling roughhousing or two. My mom loved her brothers and sisters. She loved her Mom and Dad so incredibly much too. Just before she turned 21, she moved out to California to help take care of her Aunt (my great aunt) and her aunt’s daughter as well. In the end, she took care of my great Uncle as well, all while working part time at the now-gone candy shop

Schurra’s. She was a natural born care taker, so much in fact that she worked for Kaiser in the eighties. She helped many LGBTQIA clients (Yup, my mom is an ally). After that, she worked many, many years in the insurance industry. Unfortunately, after a long career, she ended up becoming physically disabled due to other medical complications along the way.

Barbara now spends her time helping out the feral cat situation in San Jose. She has TNR’d many cats in the area, thanks to all of her amazing friends in the community.

if you’ve read this far, thank you so incredibly much. Even a $1 would help me with this goal for my mom. Even sharing this on your social media would help tremendously as well.

I will be posting updates as I find out as well. Thank you so so much

Shannon Higgins Francis