A father of three is appealing for assistance to access the life saving liver transplant surgery he urgently needs.

Andy Resal’s worsening condition has robbed him of his employment and added to his anguish. However, his failing health has not dimmed his hope of journeying on the road to recovery. Speaking at his humble home in Saroop Avenue, Las Lomas #2, Resal said he spends his days in discomfort and disbelief at what his life has become.

“This is one thing that never came to my mind. I know as people get older they get sick but I never know it would have hit me so hard and fast,” he said. It was at the start of the year that the 30-year-old market vendor’s health took a turn for the worst.

“Since the beginning of the year I started to feel sick, even before that I started not feeling well. I couldn’t take it anymore and went by the doctor. I went by the hospital and they did a blood test and when the results came back they told me I need a liver transplant and that my liver fail,” he explained.

Weakened by his illness and weighing only 90 pounds, Resal is now just a shadow of the man he once was, as the rapid decline in his body’s liver function has disabled him in more ways than one.

“I can’t work and I have three children going to school, so that is tough. From 100 pounds I used to lift in the market, I can barely lift 25 pounds. I have to take medicine everyday, my body is not feeling the same way, I also seeing very blurry now because I come and get jaundice. I can’t drive, some days I am weak and cannot move at all,” Resal said. Unable to fight back the tears, the father of three said the illness serves as a painful reminder of what matters most...life.

“The doctor tell me I living on medication right now and to try and hurry up and see how fast I can do it (liver transplant) because just now it will start to reject the medication which means I’d have to leave my family behind,” Resal said.

With a liver donor already waiting in the wings, it is a lack of finances which has grounded Resal’s hopes of recovery.

“Only one private hospital in Trinidad doing the liver transplant surgery, other than that I’d have to go to India or USA (United States of America) which will be more money.

“Right now we trying to raise the quotation (which) says $400,000 ... anywhere else overseas is US currency,” he said.

But Resal said he was not losing heart and is hopeful that he can be given a fighting chance. “I am not giving up, I have a family to fight for, young children, a young wife, I have to fight through to be there for them, they are my all. Things maybe tough but I does pray and give my offerings. I have faith.”

Anyone willing to assist can contact Resal and his family at 752-8108.