Hello everyone

Some of you have been part of my life for years, others for months, but each of you has crossed my path during different moments that meant something. I never imagined I’d be sharing a chapter like this one—certainly not for this long, and not with this much pain behind it

My life changed on Good Friday of 2023. A workplace accident took a quarter of my left foot, and with it, the version of life I thought I’d be living. For the past three years, I’ve been fighting through workers’ comp and waiting—just waiting—for disability to finally review my case. That waiting has taken a real toll, physically, mentally, and financially

But the hardest parts didn’t stop there. Since that accident, I’ve had six long hospital stays, each scarier than the last. The worst came after a surgery on Thanksgiving of 2024. A surgeon made mistakes that lacerated three areas inside my stomach without realizing it. I woke up knowing something was terribly wrong. I was silently bleeding to death and ended up needing 13 blood transfusions to keep me alive. That experience changed me in ways I still don’t fully know how to put into words

Most recently, on November 10th, a benign abscess behind my right Achilles grew to 9 cm. I ended up back in the hospital, back in surgery, and once again back in a wheelchair as I recover. Each time I think I’m on the mend, another setback knocks the wind out of me

But the person who has carried me through all of this—every fear, every surgery, every sleepless night—is my wife, Becca. She has been my strength, my anchor, my safe place when everything else feels like it’s falling apart. It hurts more than anything that I can’t provide for us the way I want to. We’re still waiting on workers’ comp, disability decisions, and legal settlements, and in the meantime, Becca and my mom have been keeping us going

I see the weight this puts on them, especially Becca, and it breaks me. I just want to take some of that burden off her shoulders—even a little—while I fight my way back to standing on my own again, literally and figuratively

If you’re able to help, in any amount, it would mean more than I can ever explain. And if you can’t donate, sharing this means just as much. Thank you for listening, for caring, and for staying connected to me through this incredibly difficult chapter

With love

Guillermo "Memo" Flores