FDNY and Selden firefighter receives a $25G donation to help with 2-year-old son's cancer treatment

A Selden volunteer firefighter whose 2-year-old son is battling a rare cancer received a welcome surprise this week — a $25,000 donation to help with the boy's medical expenses.

When Jay Matthews, 35, of Selden, got a call from his father recently, he started to suspect something was happening, he said.

"He started to ask me a bunch of random questions about where Jack was in his treatment ... I thought it was kind of weird because I knew he knew most of the answers ... he also started to ask me about my military background, which we didn’t talk about much," Matthews, in an interview on Monday evening outside Smithtown's Stonebridge Country Club, said. Inside, the McNamara Charity Golf Outing earlier that evening gave Matthews a $25,000 gift to help with the cost of medical care for his son.

Matthews, an FDNY firefighter who served in the U.S. Army and started volunteering with the Selden Fire Department at age 14, said he developed a love for public service because his family had a long history of working and volunteering. His father was a firefighter in Florida, both grandparents served in the U.S. armed forces and members of his extended family have been doing volunteer work since the 1950s, according to Matthews. His wife, Brittany Matthews, works as a nurse practitioner and is also a fire department alum.

"It’s something that I’ve always taken an interest in and seeing people reach out to people that they don’t even know on their worst days has always been kind of inspiring," Jay Matthews said.

Matthews’ family has undergone their own troubles recently. When Jack was 18 months old, his family discovered a lump on the bottom of his foot that doctors later diagnosed as BCOR sarcoma — a rare cancer that can affect soft tissues and bones, according to the University of Pittsburgh.

Although the tumor was removed, Jack is still undergoing treatment and faces years of surgeries, according to donation organizers. The family's finances have been strained because Brittany is not working so she can devote time to their son, and Jay is working only a few days a week, he said.

Despite the hardship, Matthews said his son still managed to smile during treatment.

"He’s still the happiest boy," Matthews said. "I’ve seen people sit on the couch for weeks after certain chemo treatments, but he’ll come home, he’ll run around the house for an hour and then he’ll crash. You can see it start to take its toll on him, but you can see him still trying to enjoy life, and he is. We’re beyond thankful to the doctors and for his resilience, because it helps us get through every day."

Christopher McNamara, of the McNamara Charity Golf Outing, said organizers had raised $25,000 for the family as of Monday night. Collectively, McNamara said the event was expected to raise roughly $100,000 to benefit the Matthews family and nonprofits, including Paws of War and the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation.

Visibly full of emotion, Matthews said seeing the support his family received Monday was "extremely overwhelming" and the money would help them "focus 100%" on their son’s treatment and recovery.

"For them to take time out of their day and money out of their pocket to come here and support my son, my family ... it’s unbelievable," Matthews said. "I’m incredibly thankful for everything these people and these organizations tonight have done for us. We can’t thank them enough."