My name is Paulo Arroyo. I’m 37 years old and I’ve been diagnosed with Sigmoid Colorectal Cancer. I’ve had many vicious surgeries and am currently undergoing treatment and preparing for my reversal surgery happening on Dec 10th, 2025.

In February, I started to have sharp, unbearable pains in my stomach that were physically jolting out of my body. I thought it was just my diverticulitis being violent and flaring up.

The pain persisted to the end of the month and wasn’t getting any better, but I was able to manage the pain by drinking water and eating soup. During a flare-up, it's best to stop eating solids and do liquids for 1-2 weeks. So I did just that. However, 1-2 weeks turned into 1-3 months. The pain made time go by so fast, and the only thing that helped was a homemade blend of tea my neighbor Amanda gave me.

Next thing you know, I haven’t eaten solids in 4.5 months and now have an eating disorder because it’s painful to process food and I’m scared of the pain. Literally traumatized by food. ME…TRAUMATIZED BY FOOD!!!! Now down 77 lbs in 4.5 months.

The doctors knew how much pain I was in and even compared my pain to contractions when giving birth. But because it was an elective surgery and I have no insurance, they kept pushing me to the side, telling me to wait on the list and pay out of pocket as an elective surgery. I called the hospital once a week begging them for help. They would make sure I wasn’t dead and send me off.

Fast forward into months of pain and no food. Now it’s August!! My summer has been stolen, and the pain has increased so much over the months I can’t even stand up! I had to rest 4-5 days and plan ahead to do anything. My kidneys were swollen and bulging out of my back. Turns out my colon and kidneys fused together, and I became septic, pooping pee and peeing poop!!!

Ultimately, my small intestine perforated and exploded inside my body, and I passed out from the pain. My Husky (Epifanio) jumped on me till I was up, and then I immediately went to the hospital, and that’s when shit hit the fan.

When I got into the ER, they immediately sent me for a CT body scan and EKG. Shortly after, they let me know that I have to have intensive life-changing surgery, or I’ll die.

They made all types of marks on my body for the incisions and where my organs will be fed out of my body and into bags. I was terrified!!

They gave me an epidural (that hurt sooo bad) and got me down to surgery. What was supposed to be a 4-hour surgery turned into a 9-hour surgery. They found cancer in my sigmoid and began to viciously remove it. When I woke, they let me know they removed 5 ft of intestine, a piece of my colon, and my sigmoid. They had to do a complete repair of my organs.

I needed to heal, so I was in a coma for a week. When I woke, I could barely walk and take steps because the nerves were all hit from the surgery and needed to be retrained. I then realized I have a catheter, a drainage bag in my kidneys, a drainage tube in my pelvis, a freshly installed ileostomy bag to function as my organs and two 12-inch incisions like an upside-down “T” on my stomach. The most painful and scary experience by far in life!! And it still isn’t over. I have my reversal surgery to come soon.

I come to you guys as my community. My friends. My family. I need support at this time. I’ve been battling so much by myself. Now, I’ve been informed that I need to come up with a deposit for my ileostomy reversal surgery, on top of my bills and rent. I’ve held it down and managed for so long by myself, and I would have been okay if all this hadn’t depleted my savings. If you guys could support me through this in any way possible, I would love you even more than I already do. Live life to the fullest!! Thank you so much!!