A doorbell camera captured Donald Johnson, 81, struggling to haul heavy suitcases up a steep staircase while completing a delivery in Texas. The difficult climb would soon expose the painful reason he remained on the job.

Johnson was delivering lost luggage to a home when Erin Howell, a resident at The Colony, saw him wrestling with a heavy bag on the stairs. The moment was recorded by Howell’s doorbell camera, according to reports.

Howell went outside to help Johnson with the delivery. During their conversation, she learned that he had been working as an independent contractor delivering luggage for the past three years.

The income was helping Donald Johnson cover medical expenses for his wife, Josephine Johnson, who is battling cancer, FOX 4 Dallas-Fort Worth reported. The couple has been married for 57 years.

Even as his wife continued receiving medical treatment, Donald Johnson kept making deliveries. He told Howell that he had struggled to find another job.

“It's the only job that will hire me,” Johnson told her, according to the outlet. His explanation transformed an ordinary delivery into a story that quickly captured widespread attention.

Howell shared Johnson’s circumstances online and started a fundraiser. The campaign was intended to help pay Josephine Johnson’s medical expenses while giving her husband an opportunity to stop working and care for her.

As the video and the couple’s story circulated, thousands of strangers responded with donations and supportive messages. Donald Johnson began to believe that the assistance could finally allow him to leave the delivery work behind.

“I think I'm going to be able to stop working, and that's amazing,” Johnson told FOX 4. “So we're not quite totally over the hump yet, but we're getting there very quickly.”

Josephine Johnson said the flood of support and prayers had encouraged her as she continued battling cancer. Messages from strangers gave her a renewed sense that she could face what lay ahead.

“I can face it. I think that's the big difference,” she told FOX 4. “Some have made comments and they're praying for us. And it's just — it's a joyful feeling.”

The family’s circumstances later took another dramatic turn when the fundraiser was removed from GoFundMe. That development threatened the financial help that strangers had offered after seeing Donald Johnson’s struggle.

In a recent TikTok video, the couple’s daughter, Amy Johnson, said the campaign had collected more than $700,000. She said her parents would not receive the money because the donations were being refunded due to “a technicality.”

Amy Johnson appeared alongside her parents in the TikTok video as she discussed the decision. She said the money had been intended to cover her mother’s medical expenses as she battles pancreatic cancer and to give her father, at age 81, the chance to stop working.

GoFundMe told FOX 4 that its trust and safety team determined the organizer account and fundraiser had violated the company’s terms of service. The company did not provide the exact reason for that determination.

GoFundMe said its policies require “authenticity and transparency for donors.”