I waited all my life for Tim. September 29th we will be married 4 years. Where to begin…
I am writing our story in an attempt to raise desperately needed funds to help me make my husband’s end of life journey a bit easier. We were married September 29th, 2019. Tim was diagnosed 2 days before our wedding with stage 4 colon cancer. I was devasted, to say the least. Within 2 months, he went from a healthy, active life where his passion was kayaking every Sunday on the Susquehanna with his nephew to a shell of a man 170lbs to 129 in two months with no treatment. He quit school at an early age in an attempt to make an easier life for his mother and siblings. Upon quitting school at 16 he hit the open roads working as an over the road mover. He spent very little time at home as he grew up almost instantly observing our country through conversations with strangers. When the moving truck stopped at some lonely diner late at night 🌙 those became some of Tim’s greatest life lessons. He learned to appreciate the kindness of strangers and then working like crazy, sending money home weekly to his mother as he drove from state to state.
Well fast forwarding, he almost died within the first 7 months of our marriage . Here I waited all my life for Tim and God’s plan is not for us to grow old together but to call him back because he obviously needs Tim to serve in a different capacity than his earthly body. We decided to bucket list before we ran out of time and money. Our first wedding anniversary we went skydiving! ❤️ it’s was amazing and a moment I won’t ever forget. He went into remission and I thought God had answered my prayers…but it was short-lived and two months later Tim was diagnosed with a mass on his brain. He went from a quiet, kind, loving man to someone I at times didn’t even know. It began to cause him to lose feeling in his hands and feet and mobility in his legs. He began having petite maul seizures. Those brought on confusion, paranoia at times, and once again it was stripping him of his memory and the ability to comprehend even the simplest of tasks like opening a bag of candy and struggling and working himself into a fit that the bag would eventually break open and spill everywhere. The pain was becoming quite intense and he was sick, depressed at not being able to come to grips with his fate and he would go days without sleep because he hurt so badly. He became a stranger to me and when he no longer appreciated me helping him with everything and felt worthless or thought that I was mad that I “got stuck” taking care of him. I never felt that way but became frustrated, I was working two jobs, went from going to bed each night for only maybe 4 hours and then dragging myself to work only to repeat the whole 2 job cycle again the next day. Because everything was shut down during the height of covid, I couldn’t pay all our bills on just my unemployment. He was denied the first round of putting in a claim to social security and sadly he was granted his ssdi 12 days after we lost our home here in Elizabethtown. He went to stay with his family bc I begged so that he would at least have stability. I couldn’t give him that and I couldn’t stay where he was with his family and we began to drift apart. I became so bitter bc I couldn’t afford to help him and to get a place so I lived in our storage unit for almost 9 months. I took a shower bag to the train station at 6 every morning so I could take a bird bath in the public bathroom sink. Washing my body and my hair …I shaved my legs every day other day and holy moly, managed to apply my makeup and I was presentable enough that no one else ever knew how badly I was struggling. But I went to work every day!
Well winding down I only existed till July 13th , 2022 and I bought a one way ticket to Florida. I lost my home, my husband, and because of covid my job and my dependable used car.
Well I bought a one-way ticket to Florida, boarded the plane, and knew I was never coming back. I was alone and afraid but I got a cleaning job for a property management company cleaning 100 FSU and FAMU properties and 70 airbnb a week after I got to Florida. I continued to put in application after application. well After 2 months I got a job as a day porter for a huge federal credit union’s corporate offices. The money was horrible but I loved the employees. It gave me the confidence to keep reaching higher and I did but 296 resumes sent out and nothing!!!! Till at my last straw, I submitted a job application for an asst practice administrator for a large internal medicine group and I got it!! I was making $36k a year, had a condo, and had saved my pennies to buy myself a 2008 Honda Civic. I then tried to repair the missed time together and knew he would always be the one so we started speaking daily and I was going to relocate him to Florida to make the end easier for him and we both could find closure. I proved to myself that I could get it all back and it was wonderful for 2 months and then the bottom dropped out! I was permanently downsized a week after Thanksgiving 2022. I used my glowing letter of recommendation to sob in for the month of December. Tim called crying and said that he had been diagnosed with small cell myeloma which is lung cancer and a rare form that is uncurable and inoperable bc its rapidly growing and the tumor on his lung is pressing on his left ventricle and he will eventually smother to death or have a massive heartache attack. I told him to hold on, I was coming for him. He was hospitalized for two weeks before he let me know how bad things had gotten. He was trying to hold on. I drove 1500 miles home by myself on January 1st. I had lost my new life, my job, my condo. I came almost 1500 miles to be with him till death do us part. And then my vehicle only stopping home in NJ where I grew up to see my best friend and have her nod and say go get Tim. Bring him home. Another pressing issue arose and I had to take care of it and I didn’t get home till March 1st. Upon seeing Tim he started to cry, took off his cap to reveal not a hair on his body! He never wanted chemo but began aggressive chemo 3 days on then 21 days off. Then he would have a port put in and begin radiation only to give him just a little more time with me. We needed that time to fix what had gone wrong as his condition rapidly declined.
Tim collaped Thursday at the doctor’s office. I arrived from an appt in Lancaster to see him heaving for breath. Hooked to oxygen, and sobbing bc of the extreme pain in his chest and head and he is afraid to go to the hospital without me and die alone. He pulled all the lines out and stumbled out of the doctor’s office as we were waiting for an ambulance that he thought would be his end!
I have gone to every agency and no one has funds to help bc it’s a tough time for many families. He was in a tent alongside the creek for 2 months waiting for me to get home after his son threw him out the beginning of January. His ex-wife helped herself to $1800 while he was hospitalized leaving him $20. I’m trying desperately to get us into a 55+ bldg. Here in town but I haven’t been able to find any emergency housing or assistance..what do we do, where do we go? Please help us with anything to help us to hang on in the motel till I can get us housing that’s affordable. We haven’t even paid our storage of $135 a month since January, so we owe February and March and I cringe at the thought of loosing EVERY THING. It’s with on track storage 54 brown st. Unit #15 Kimberly Acevedo-Graham Elizabethtown,Pennsylvania 17022
and allow fast forwarding to 3 weeks worth of phone calls, emails, inquires on the internet…Every avenue is out of funds, has no room. Or long waiting lists. We are in the street Monday March 20th at 11 am. I called every number provided by 211. Then compass. And today and yesterday Elizabethtown echoes shelter. My husband can not live in shelter bc of his compromised immune system and once the morning comes I can’t wander the streets with him exposed to the elements. So a quick recap, Diagnosed September 2019 colon cancer, almost died in the first 7 months, 2 months remission and then a mass on his brain that has caused him to have memory loss, cognitive thinking at times, confusion, petite maul seizures, that have caused him over time to lose the mobility in his hands and feet and lastly October 2022 Diagnosed with small cell myeloma which is rapidly growing and is inoperable and uncurable. 53cm to 74cm in 6 weeks time. The tumor is pressing on his left ventricle and he will eventually smother to death or die of a cardiac arrest. He was hospitalized for 2 weeks in December and basically sent home to die which the doctors due not expect him to live till the summer. His breathing is labored now and he is being prescribed pain management. I’m trying to get him portable oxygen machine if ins. Will cover and also an electric chair 💺. Please I’m desperate and monday march 20Th is our 11th hour. We have nowhere to go. 🙏 please, I’m begging. Kimberly and Timothy Graham 51 and 59. I currently am not working due to his needing me to assist him in daily living and he only receives $914 a month with SSDI.