My name is Mark, a special education paraprofessional for Tomball ISD, a long-term childhood (age3-6) cancer (non-Hodgkins Lymphoma) survivor and I’m reaching out because I’ve been facing a series of medical issues that have made life especially challenging. Over the past several months, my health has forced me to miss a lot of work, due to pain from complications with my childhood cancer treatments (bad spinal tap causing nerve clumping) and flank pain from the kidney tumor, which means I haven’t been able to bring home my full paycheck. On top of that, the medical bills from ongoing treatments have started to pile up, making it even harder to keep up with daily expenses.

Right now, I need to undergo a procedure to remove a tumor on my kidney. The cost of this surgery, along with the regular bills and basic living expenses, has become overwhelming. Being a teachers aid (now you know why it feels financially impossible) ideally I would have the procedure @the end of May so that I can recover over the summer. Also ideally, I would recover over those 6-8 weeks over the summer. However, from having had a previous discectomy, it typically takes longer to heal than 6-8 weeks but at least this will give me a head start so that I don’t have to miss too much of the 2026-2027 school year.

I already have a condition known as arachnoiditis and on top of all of that I have a bulging disc in my spine (L5,L6) coupled with scar tissue from my discectomy in 2018, which makes it difficult to move in general because it rubs against the nerve clumping at L4 S1 which caused the diagnosis of arachnoiditis in 2015.

As I focus on my recovery and work towards getting back on my feet, I’m hoping for a little help to bridge the gap and relieve some of the financial stress on my family.

I would truly appreciate anything anyone is willing to give to support me during this difficult time. Your kindness and generosity mean the world to me and my family, and we are so grateful for any support you can offer.

Update: 02/13/26

Some people have been asking me about how much the procedure would be. I just got off the phone with Memorial Hermann Pre-service Center and they informed me it will be a whopping $3,240.69 because I haven’t met my deductible of course.

Thank y’all for all the support and kindness y’all have shown!