Please take a moment and read my story.

I would like to offer another idea if you don’t feel comfortable sending money through Go Fund Me. While Go Fund Me pages are a great resource for so many who have a situation arise and needed help from their friends, family, and community. However there are processing fees at the very end just like with anything else these days. So if you don’t feel comfortable paying their extra fee they add and you want to make sure your help all goes to my family and I. Please text my mother at 2169731247 and she can share an address where any form of money can be sent or even gift cards have been coming in and helpful for so many personal health and food needs as we are a family of 6 too.

Now time for my story.

I never thought I would be asking for help like this, and I am not always good about asking for help even when it is really needed. But the health news for myself recently has impacted me and my entire family, and it has changed our situation as far as paying monthly bills go. With a family of 6, so many things like food are continually increasing in the budget and one one in diapers and multiple in pull ups. We go through a lot. Then after having a much-needed craniotomy surgery through University Hospitals in Cleveland on October 24, 2024, and all the hospital recovery days, ambulance transfer ride, CT scans, MRIs, and all the provider fees and all the costs of being in the hospital, we know the medical bills are going to be a very large amount.

I am Cassandra Marie Ault (maiden name Linden) and I grew up in Wellington, Ohio. My parents, Anne Brinker Linden (graduated from Wellington) and Charles Linden (graduated from Black River) a river rat were great examples of love and always provided and prioritized family to my brother Cory Linden and me. They also instilled faith in us from an early age and made going to church important for our family. God was at the center we he needs to be. We were always members of St Patrick’s Catholic Parish Church in Wellington. I went through the Parish School Religoion program through my Senior year. I am still a member there now and have been raising our children in that Parish and my Isabella is in the PSR program now too. Having my faith has helped me in all things that I have gone through in my entire life. Including helping carry me and keep me safe in this brain tumor journey recovery that I am on. God has kept me safe through this whole thing and will continue to do that and is providing for myself and my family. He knew what he was doing and has my path set up perfect. I graduated from Wellington High School in 2005 and was one of the valedictorians, and they made me salutatorian, and I got to give a speech at graduation. I met my husband in 2006, and we were married on July 17, 2007. After high school, I decided nursing was my calling, and I went to Lorain County Community College in Elyria, Ohio, and graduated with an Associate degree RN in 2011. Then the plans changed, and my husband Derrick Ault and I decided to move to Phoenix, Arizona, and we followed through on that idea and were there for a few years. I had never lived outside of Ohio before, and we both wanted a change in weather and better job opportunities for Derrick. Then through a string of choices, we ended up back in Ohio around 2014 because Ohio is home and family is so important to both of us. It is one of the greatest gifts and blessings.

I actually never ended up working a day as a nurse yet. I found out I was expecting, and we had our first child, a daughter Isabella, in May of 2015. Then we moved between Ohio and West Virginia a few times but of course ended up settling in Ohio. We ended up buying a house in 2017 in a pretty calm area of Wellington, pretty close to all the schools in Wellington. Next, we found out we were expecting again and were blessed with another baby girl, Gianna, in November of 2018. We felt so blessed. I don’t think we had a number of kids in our heads, just whatever God would bless and gift us with. Move ahead to 2020, and we welcomed a third baby girl, Madalina, into the family in July of 2020. Our hearts were so full. But our hearts grew more than we thought possible when we welcomed a fourth child in January of 2023, a son this time, Luka. So blessed!!!

So all along this time, Derrick had different jobs, and Cassandra did work at one point at Sprenger Elms nursing home in Wellington, and then she went into the office at Village Market in Wellington and did accounts payable and secretary duties. Her family helped care for Isabella during some of this, and she made lots of bonds with grandmas and grandpas on both sides. However, a slight change happened in 2017. She talked to her amazing employers at Village Market because she was expecting Gianna, and she asked if she could take her computer home with her and do work from home so she could care for Bella and the new baby also. Even though they didn’t have a work-from-home position made for that and no one else there works from home, Steve and Tammie Krakomperger made an exception, and I am so grateful to them for that. It ended up working out very well, and I would go into the store to get papers I needed, and then weekly, I would bring some back and file them. Then with technology today, lots of things were done through email, phone, or scanning through the copier to email, and it surprisingly was working out quite well. The only downside was not seeing my coworkers. So over the past 9 years, Cassie has been working from home and caring for her now 4 children and keeping up with the house or trying to.

Going Downhill

Now comes in my health story in 2024. If we go back, say a year ago, maybe only 6 months, I started having these headaches, mainly pain radiating right in the center of my forehead, and it was out of my normal and extreme fatigue, and I couldn’t quench my thirst either, and some other off-normal things I was noticing, and I didn’t feel like myself and started getting behind and disorganized at work, which was completely unlike me, and at home, I couldn’t keep up with the household duties, and every task was seeming to take too much energy from me, even taking care of my children. My family had really started to notice things, and they did at work too. Then I had an episode on October 21st where I wasn’t feeling good, and the headache radiating made me throw up, and I felt tingling in my right arm. My mom and my mother-in-law were over at our house at the time and told me they thought I should get checked out, so my mom ended up taking me to the Emergency Room in Oberlin Ohio to be checked out. Once I told the doctor my headache symptoms and that they had been going on for three to six months, if not longer, he put in for me to have a CT scan. That scan was a blessing because it revealed I had a large mass on my brain. So the doctor set up for me to have a follow-up appointment with Dr. Gale Hazen the next day, October 22nd. Dr. Haden got in touch with the University Hospitals neurology team of surgeons in Cleveland, and he found a way for me to get an MRI faster, because of that, I was able to be helped and in surgery faster by going through the ER. This really made all the difference. Once the team saw my MRI results, they came up with a plan, and I had a craniotomy brain surgery on October 24th 2024. Surgery went well; however, they did have to leave a few sections of the tumor in because they were in unsafe parts of my brain to take, and they couldn’t jeopardize any of my vital life functions or my speech. We still don’t know what type of tumor it was because pathology reports take up to two weeks. I do have a follow-up visit on November 12th, and they should have some results back by then. Either way, I am going to need at least radiation to get rid of the last two parts of the tumor. The amazing neurosurgery team, mine led by Dr. Tiffany Hodges, was a success, and after surgery, I could see, walk, talk, and all the things. Surprisingly, they didn’t have to shave off much of my hair, and so that was nice of them. Such a blessing overall to be able to restore my body from the literal tumor that was draining me of all thing that make me me. Then after surgery, I was passing all the neuro checks, and my vitals stayed good, and my drain was having good output, so I was able to be discharged on October 28th. I went to stay at my moms house to be cared for and have the safest environment for healing. It was extremely hard because I had been away from all my kids and my husband for over a week, and I barely get a day away, let alone a week. The location worked out really well, and a family member or friend was always there, especially at night, to help me because there are lots of restrictions after brain surgery, and I couldn’t lift things either. So grateful for every soul who has helped. You are all my angels.

My healing and recovery have been going along good due to my amazing family and friends and the community of Wellington rallying around me and supporting and encouraging me. I have never felt so loved and pampered, and everyone’s goal is putting my health and healing first so I can fully recover back to Cassie. Love at its highest here and the strong power of prayer moving along through all this so very strongly all while God has been answering all the prayers and showing love as he does. My husband Derrick had to step up and take over as one of the main caretakers for the four kids which was not what he was used to and all while he was so stressed and worried about my health. He then was also doing the laundry and dishes and took over the household duties and The school schedules too. Also trying to be able to see me too and have some dinner together or watch a show we like which had been long over due having kids. Between him and, my mom,and my aunt Hulie who I think of as my second mom who was there along the way from taking me to my first appointment with Dr Hazen where he initially didn’t think surgery was an option until we got the MRI results back. my mother in law who my kids adore, my amazing best friends, and other family they worked as a team to keep up with the kids daily and school schedules and made the kids still feel loved and special. I can’t even begin to thank all of you who have said a kind word, thought of me, sent something, made or bought food for my family, cared for my kids through all this, prayed, or whatever it was. I am so beyond grateful, and my heart is so full right now with feeling all that love. The best medicine for the soul.

So I feel that maybe creating this would help take a little stress off my family and my momma, who has been trying to help support us but does not have the means to keep paying our monthly bills and her own and stay afloat. Derrick had just transitioned to a new job opportunity right before we found out the tumor news, and it has been so mentally and emotionally draining for him, myself, and the rest of our friends and family that he is still figuring out the new opportunity and had to step back due to the stress and he needed to be there for the kids. Then I had been working part time but once all this happened I could not anymore due to the surgery and restrictions and needs no to recover. and so my contribution to our family was taken away. I don’t want to make people think they have to do anything, but anything would help us at this point, and we are all eternally grateful and appreciate everything that so many have already done so far. But please do one thing for me. I have so many sweet souls in my life, and some of you are so selfless. Make sure that whatever you may feel like giving does not put you to the point of not being able to pay one of your own bills or food. I love you all so much, and thank you for even just thinking of me and for listening to my story. Cassandra