On Friday, November 14th, Riley was admitted to the E.R. and had emergency surgery to drain an abscess due to a ruptured appendix. We were told he will have to be admitted for around 2 weeks while they continued to drain the abscess, fight the infection, and stabilize him before they can do another surgery to remove his appendix.

While recovering in post-op, he continued to decline, ended up with fluid around his lungs, and had to be moved to ICU and put on high-pressure oxygen supplementation as well as a PICC line, NG tube, and other around-the-clock care to keep him stable.

It is going to be a long road ahead; we still do not know how long he will be hospitalized. This is extremely difficult for Riley as most of you know he is autistic and doesn’t understand what’s going on or why he can’t go home. I’ve already been missing work so that I can be with him as much as possible and have hardly slept all week spending the nights at the hospital.

What only my closest friends know is that we have already been going through extremely difficult times emotionally and financially for the past couple of years, but especially this last month. I am a single mom trying to balance working full-time from home with caring for a special needs child 24/7. I keep most of our struggles to myself and somehow find a way to solve them on my own time and time again.

Most recently, we had to move with few resources and not much time to prepare. We just got the keys to our new place 2 days before he was hospitalized.

I’m finally at the point where I cannot deny needing help any longer; I’m physically and emotionally pushed past my breaking point.

I’ve managed so far to pull off the logistics of Riley being hospitalized, including finishing the move.

Many of you have asked how you can help, and as much as I hate to ask, what we need most right now is financial assistance. I was out of PTO and paid FMLA for the year when this happened and just used all the money I had to get us into our new place. I tried asking HR about working from the hospital but because I’m in the medical field myself they won’t allow it due to potential HIPAA violations. Now, between missing work, gas driving back and forth from the hospital, parking around the hospital, potential medical bills if not covered by insurance (hoping this isn’t an issue but not sure yet), and many other related expenses with no end in sight, I worry about my ability to continue to be here to support him and not immediately lose our new place or fall into debt.

Thank you all so much for the outpouring of love and support, thoughts and prayers, and offers to help where and how you can. I appreciate you all!