KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — A Knoxville business is stepping up to support a 12-year-old boy as he prepares for radiation treatments after undergoing a procedure to remove a brain tumor.
Hudson Roberts loves sports and hanging out with his family and friends. A year ago, he was a healthy and happy child. Emily Roberts, his mother, said things started to change near the start of this school year.
“He started having kind of infrequent vomiting in the mornings, headaches, just not feeling like he could get up and go quickly in the mornings,” she said.
In December, he passed out at school. Then a few days later, doctors discovered a brain tumor at the back of his head. Emily said he was sent to have a CT scan done at East Tennessee Children’s Hospital. She said he was seen immediately and within 20 minutes, they were told doctors found a mass at the back of his head.
A few days later, Emily said Hudson had surgery to remove it. He spent around a week and a half in the hospital recovering before he was able to recover at home.
“Radiation will start next week, we’re thinking, and go on for six weeks and he’ll go every weekday to do that. And then chemo will start after that,” said Roberts.
A full course of radiation treatment could between $4,500 and $50,000, with out-of-pocket costs usually expected, according to GoodRx. That’s why Knoxville neighbors are stepping in to help.
Gage Hampel is the founder of a clothing brand, Ole Tenn Outfitters. The company said it is designing clothing to support Hudson. The clothes say, “Fields of Dreams” and feature Gibbs’ sports logo. The company said 100% of those proceeds will go toward his treatment. The company is also donating 20% of its other profits to the cause.
“When I started this company I didn’t start it for me. I was like, ‘How can we be invested in our community?’ This gives us the perfect opportunity to be able to do that. We came on as the official partner for branding for Gibbs Youth Sports. And someone had called me one night and he’s like, ‘Man, we got this young boy. His name’s Hudson. He’s been diagnosed with cancer. I really wanna do something to help him,’ and the first thing I thought of was, like, we’ll do a t-shirt,” he said.
His business partner, Bryan Parkerson, said this is also an important mission for him because he had a grandparent pass away from cancer. He said he and Hampel are standing by the Roberts family while Hudson recovers.
“I know we’re a new company and we’re small, but I’m not gonna stop until we find a way to cover this kid’s treatment. It’s bad enough to know your child has cancer, but to have to sit back and watch them go through the treatment and you can’t fix this for him. I can’t imagine what that must be like. We wanna cover the treatment, but they need all the hope they can get in a situation like this,” said Pakerson.
Emily said it’s nice to feel the support from people she knows, and from complete strangers.
“We’re just taking it day-by-day, but it does help you to know that you’re being supported like that by strangers just wanting to help, and going beyond what is expected and what they need to do just to help a family,” said Roberts.
She said she would appreciate prayers from anyone who isn’t able to help her family financially.
A coworker and friend of Hudson’s father, Sam, has also pitched in to help. They’ve started a GoFundMe campaign for medical expenses.