My father, Salvador, has always been a selflessly generous man. Myself and my four sisters have found our own paths in life thanks to his nurturing care and devotion. He protected all of us as young children throughout the difficult civil war in El Salvador, and never allowed adversities to compromise our lives. Over time, we all left El Salvador, and were able to make better lives for ourselves because of his selflessness. He stayed behind to look after our grandmother.
A few days ago, my father was hospitalized with congestive heart failure, pulmonary hypertension, and cardiogenic shock. His short-term prognosis was dire, and word from the doctors swiftly moved from hopeful treatment to more resigned suggestions of palliative care. A less painful way of saying “hospice care,” really: our father was going to die. We were urged to make travel arrangements to accompany him at his deathbed.
Through the concerted efforts of our immediate family and the doctors, the prism through which Dad’s situation can be viewed has suddenly taken a shockingly positive turn: his condition is now stable but is entirely dependent on a complex and expensive system of life support which we simply cannot afford.
I have been hesitant to bring myself to publicly plead for monetary support for many reasons – one of them being how this would embarrass my father, an enduring figure of self-reliance to (I’m reasonably certain of this) many people in his life. But it has come to this. We do need your help to keep our father alive and have come to terms with the fact that without outside help, he won’t make it.
Despite the unpredictability of his needs – these will vary and their magnitude will hopefully diminish in proportion to the improvement of his health – in the interest of clarity, I can name the most immediate, concrete requirements:
One-time expense for CPAP Machine + Mask, Portable Oxygen = $4,600
Yearly expense for nurses, medications, respiratory therapy, required monthly hospital visits: $57,000
There are no words for the gratitude we feel toward all of you in this difficult moment.
