Help Michele with Expenses — Update 2/18/2022

Hello everyone,

I am thankful to all of you who have supported my GoFundMe Campaign so far in this process of purchasing a wheelchair accessible vehicle. The van was purchased with a loan, using the funds raised as a down payment. The van is super helpful and super expensive. It has been 4 months since my last update and so much has happened since then.

In my last update, I shared that my mother was diagnosed with cancer and was starting treatments while hospitalized. Sadly, she passed away on October 18, 2021. Her body was overwhelmed by the lung cancer and treatments and when she developed an infection, she had no immune system to mount a response. Her infection was likely a combination of a lung infection from the doctors draining a substantial amount of fluid right before she was discharged to a rehabilitation hospital and a urinary tract infection.

I was able to be by her bedside and send her to her ancestors while playing the hymns and songs I know she loved. So, this was one of the better ways I could think of to help her transition. My mother was an amazing woman who more than once sang “Amazing Grace” at a Karaoke bar. I don’t think there was a dry eye in the place when she did this. Once all supports were withdrawn (as was her wish if it was unlikely that she could recover), she was gone quickly and as comfortably as possible.

My life has changed significantly. She is no longer in the next room. My mom isn’t here to cook the frozen chicken livers in the freezer. I miss her shoulder to lean on and her laugh and her never-ending faith in me and what I have to offer. She was my cheerleader, my friend, my roommate, my in-home personal assistant, and my mother.

The time she was in the hospital and the days in the rehabilitation facility were filled with conversations of her affirming me and who I had become and how far I have come. She did not want to be a burden ever and she was slowly reconciling to being sicker and having to deal with the cancer with hopes of a few more years to be here for me and others. We talked about how proud she was of me too for my disability advocacy and activism and my professional skills and my systems advocacy skills as well.

I had to suspend this campaign because I had to shift the beneficiary from my mother back to myself. That was not an easy process. The last 4 months have not been easy with many firsts after my mother’s death: the first birthday without her, the first Thanksgiving, the first Christmas, and the first New Year. A new worker is another addition to my new experiences also.

Fortunately, I had community support to help keep me going throughout this time. My budget continues to be tight with the loss of my mother’s half of expenses. I am looking for ways to increase my earnings while not fully impacting my health and well-being. Sadly, like too many other people in this country, I am struggling to meet my medical and health needs, buy healthy food, and pay my bills.

My van and insurance payments total $740 per month. Until something else changes, my hope is to get a portion of this monthly to get a little bit of breathing room. Over the next few months, many other changes are apt to happen as I continue to recover from this loss. Hopefully, I only will need support for a few months as I find better solutions to the struggle of being disabled and poor in the US.

Many thanks again to everyone for your support, financial and otherwise. I need my emotional supporters too!

My Go Fund Me Campaign Link is https://gofund.me/ecee98ec.

If you prefer to use Venmo, my Venmo ID is @Michele-M13.