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Please help Ashley beat Lyme + Co

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Friends near and far, fans, family and strangers,
This is the absolute hardest most humbling shaky scary message I've ever had to write and I've been debating it for longer than I should have. Asking for help isn't something that I have been raised to do or know how to do. I have been raised to be quiet and endure. I think most people are.
I am going through the hardest thing I've ever had to go through. I've been sick for 14 years with a 'mystery neurological illness'  which was never resolved, though it was liveable. This initial illness displaced most of my memory, my ability to see colors correctly, my eyesight and my ability to sleep without being shocked in and out of sleep. Again though, it was liveable.
About 3.5 years ago, it became more acute after a very traumatic experience, which left with my eyebrows falling out and a very complicated case of shingles that left painful scarring on my left ribcage. The stress of that time and the initial virus left my already compromised immune system permanently inundated and my adrenals so fatigued that my entire endocrine system slowly started malfunctioning as it became more and more out of balance. It began with exhaustion and over the course of the last 3.5 years has become so bad, I currently have hypopituitary, secondary adrenal insufficency, and hypothyroid.  
Further & to add insult to injury, I was diagnosed with nuerological lyme's disease and its coinfections when I was working on getting my endocrine issues sorted through an incredibly flawed medical system.  
I have seen allopathic doctors which led me very quickly to better doctors: naturopaths, energy workers, acupuncturists, herbalists, reiki practitioners, cranial sacral therapists, shamanic healers, mayan healers, ayurvedic healers, functional medicine doctors, fill in the __________. 
I wish my story could just stop there and get better, but it doesn't. With the plethora of testing I received naturopathically and via a functional medicine doctor, finally last year, I was also diagnosed with what is called mold toxicity when I came back as positive for having a lethal dose of black mold in my own system. We discovered my apartment and childhood home - a place i'd spent the bulk of my life (on and off) had black mold and aspergillus freely growing in a wet and dark basement. This adds something to the body called 'neurotoxins' which essentially, just like lyme, poisons your nervous system, damaging it and slowly disabling it. 
All of these things together, slowly and overtime left untreated, caused me to develop an autoimmune disorder much like MS or Lupus. For brevity sake, an autoimmune disorder is an immune response to something the body detects as an infection or 'foreign' and over time, with an unresolved infection or toxic exposure, the body stops having a normal immune response, becomes overworked, confused, and is too inflamed and begins attacking itself kind of through an overzealous misfiring of itself to get whatever it is out of you. My body has developed such a severe immune response to almost every food, drink, etc, even crashing in sunlight from being so inflamed that the heat is so much I have an autoimmune 'crash' | Typically during these crashes, my respiration cuts out and I end up in a hospital with an IV in my arm and them monitoring my heartrate. 
I wish my story could just stop there and get better, but it doesn't...
When the body is immunocompromised, from lyme or mold or any other infection that poisons the nervous system, you just start taking on infection after infection from lack of immunity. This is when things begin to really spiral.
In the last year, from being so immunocompromised at these exposures and in such end stage systemic exhaustion, I took on yet another infection which damaged my kidneys. Doctors didn't decide to treat for 7 months because of a flubbed lab report and in that time, it not only extensively damaged my kidneys and adrenals, but moved up into my lungs and heart, thyroid and finally my brain. Needless to say, I have been largely homebound since. Who wouldn't be I guess?
Unfortunately, I was also mostly alone in that time. Much of the last year has been spent in a bed or on a couch, laying, developing shaking and unable to support my own body weight. 
At this point when I stand up I am so tachycardic I cannot stand up without risking something incredibly serious. I am unable to take walks most days and the farthest I can make it is out to the yard. Like most people with chronic infection and mold toxicity, I am highly sensitive to EMF, not made better by living in the heart of a city.
I have not been able to do anything on my own for over a year. This is so humiliating that usually I try to do so, even when it risks my life. This has been especially hard because being a teacher and photographer had me traveling nearly 24/7 the world over and photographing/editing in every waking moment, all things I heartily enjoyed.
In the last ten months, I have not been able to take a full breath more than a few times, having what is known as 'air hunger', my lungs are so swollen that they hurt, and my neurotransmitters are so out of whack that nothing is regulating my mood, breathing, sleep, etc.
My digestion has been so damaged from poisoning and infection that I am not absorbing my food and nutrients and ulcers have formed, further disabling my ability to properly eat. The last 4 months my nervous system started being eaten into as well as my myelin sheaths and I have stopped being able to control swallowing, lifting my arms at certain times of the day, and squeezing my stomach as I become more and more oxygen deprived and toxic, causing poisoning and oxidative damage to my very mitochondria, the energy cores of the entire body on the cellular level. I am very close to the diagnoses of ALS at this point, which is typically fatal according to allopathic medicine. A mitochondrial disorder is also something that can take your life. 
A month or so ago, they found lumps on my pituitary. I also have lumps throughout my stomach. lungs, pelvis and breasts. Because these were not cancerous, nor has any of my bloodwork been too out of range, I have continued to slip and slip through the cracks of the medical system with no solid treatment plans, even wheelchaired out to a curb from an ER on several occasions, when I was nearly unconscious and couldn't walk.
All people who have ever gone through *chronic* lyme or its coinfections know that western medicine doesn't believe in, nor will treat it. They know absolutely nothing of nutrition beyond a few hours of training and they know absolutely nothing on how to treat mold exposures. 
Lastly, perhaps the straw that broke the camels back, my relationship ended under the strain of such endless prolonged illness, leaving me alone to take care of myself about 2 months ago for the first time in years and back in the house where mold poisoned me and is still growing in the basement. It was quite the transition.
These are not the kind of molds that friends can come over and clean up. And trust me, we all considered it.
They require hazmat suits and professional equipment. They will hurt anyone that breathes them in for any amount of time at all. 
I've been here for two months trying to figure out what to do while watching my health decline even further. I cannot sit here and do that any longer. I cannot pretend that taping the vents will protect me from mold already in the house and I have  no energy to clean even a countertop.
Presently, half of my days, my body will no longer adjust to outside air. The regulatory signals in my body are destroyed. Noone yet even really knows what causes this so it's just labeled 'damage' and I am sent on my way. Obviously this is terrifying, especially for someone who was so rooted in nature.
What I have today, because of all of the above, is referred to as an infectious brain injury. Many have heard of traumatic brain injuries, which leave people in wheelchairs and disabled, with strokes or paralysis, from things like car accidents. Mine is no different, except caused by massive infection and poisoning and no treatment for it.
I feel so alone the last months, more alone than I have ever felt. 
I have cried so often these months in the dark, alone in corners, not wanting to bother anyone. My best and closest friends have convinced me that I must reach out, even if it ruins my career. 

I can't tell you the journey it is to be a person who has gone through this or watching partners and family, become so traumatized through hospitals and late nights, that one day their eyes begin glazing over as they watch a loved one slowly die, not having any idea where to go or what to do.
I can't tell you how many people in this world have to go through autoimmune disorders where doctors send their patients home to die, not truly understanding the real underlying cause.
I can't tell you how many people have to do this that have lyme and its coinfections or mold exposures being sent home to do the same.
My family and friends and especially myself, have exhausted all of our funds and abilities, both in manpower and financially. 

We have spent nearly 70,000$ dollars out of our pockets, I have seen more doctors than are countable. We have exhausted the options in MN. I don't have a house that is safe to breath in. I don't have enough medical support here. My heart is breaking under the weight of this illness and from the loss of so much. But my spirit is not broken and I am opening myself to the world.
I always, always, try to remain strong & positive, but I'm afraid and I'm opening myself.
******I want to live****** | This is an important part, that I still choose to live . I feel sometimes even, that choosing to live is a key to doing so. I have faced death a handful of times in these years,  tilting my head at it and considering if it was just time & came back thinking "no" - I want to live.

I loved my life & I love this world. I was running on scottish hillsides when I began to notice I truly wasn't myself anymore. I was in the middle of a bookdeal that had to fall through when concentration in writing it began to cause my body to crash.

So in entirety, this campaign is for 'expenses', but specifically the following:
1:) A place to live (We have even considered building one of those 'tiny houses' in the back yard with our own hands) -- Any amount of any mold hidden anywhere can trigger more immune responses and start the cycle all over again. I have moved many times into many other houses, all with enough mold hidden somewhere where I continue to be sick) | Many people with mold involvement end up moving to a coast in mold free areas and living in a tent for 6 weeks, such as arizona where the air is an ill match for mold growth.
2:) help with moving there
3:) Getting to the doctors that treat 'fringe' cases like mine. This will likely mean getting me into an inpatient clinic (we are presently speaking with several clinics on separate coasts), that are *functional medicine* doctors extensively trained in IV therapy, such as UVBI, ozone, intravenous antibiotics and who are also extensively trained in infectious brain damage / injuries and those who know how to heal environmental illness' and late stage neuro lyme.
4:) Food support while I heal. This is more important than it seems. 

I have been very very hesitant to run a GoFundMe for a variety of reasons. I thought the name itself sounded almost ungrateful and so presumptuous that strangers are expected to 'fund' me. This is of course just semantics but I felt strongly about it and wanted to mention.
Additionally, I don't like asking for help from people the world round that no doubt have their own limitations, illness', and problems. 
But, with a lot of coercing over the weekend from many closer friends as well as strangers, I have decided one thing is more important than all of my trepidation of bothering others, being judged or not getting 'funded' and that's LIVING. I love living. Oh god, I love living. I *loved* my life.
Getting to live, getting to heal, getting to remember my life and getting to live again is just about all I ever want, in any given day or moment.

I am very, very weak and I don't know how much longer I actually have. I wanted to get this going now since many of the right clinics have waiting lists that are already months away at the earliest. This fund will also help in supplemental support and home treatments long enough that I might make it to the day that an inpatient clinic finally calls and says 'we finally have a bed for you'. At that point, we will immediately get in a car and drive.

I'm needing all the help of the world or I don't think I'm going to beat this. It's just too progressed. I have truly fallen through the cracks of medicine, while I had the time to do this in a better way and believe me I used those hours at 100% of what I could've done. I have not had a day off in 3.5 years but I promise, as I have been, I will continue to fight every day and every night, the ins & the outs. I will not rest. I have too much left to live and to give others.

They say that people shouldn't need anyone in this life, that we all should only have ourselves to rely on.
And I'm sorry, but people who say that have never ever gone through life threatening illness. While it is true we are all complete inside, that my soul is steady and should I heal, my path is clear...For now, if my body is to live, I most definitely need the help of others. Probably *many* others.

I need you guys. I need you now more than ever.
I just can't do it alone anymore. I am throwing pride aside. This is my opening up.

I can't handle any more weekends alone in a bed questioning if I'll make the weekend while the world spins along outside my window. 

From the bottom of my heart, I am asking my entire network (and grateful if that could be extended and extended, shared beyond my own) to mobilize and help me get out of this house #1, and #2, get me out of this state and to a clinic that can help save my life. That's all I know to ask for.

****Please also if you know inpatient clinics that help people with Lyme, Mold, Heavy Metal / IV therapy, please message me as we are looking at absolutely all options.

Lastly, Briefly: Since 2006, I have dedicated my life to being a creative and to teaching and sharing that you MUST first find your path and then follow your path. I hope I've inspired my network of friends and fans enough through my life message and through my writing and fine art, that you can help me continue that.  

I have a warrior spirit and promise with my whole heart, that if I live, I will live well and in service to others.
With my extensive knowledge of spirituality, herbal medicine, regular medicine and my journey in creativity, I will dedicate the rest of my life to coming to your houses and hugging you, holding you and helping you find that path to doing whatever it is you want to do with your 'one wild, precious life.'

That's my only mission I've realized in all of this and I promise to follow it through. 

We didn't know a number to ask for in this campaign. These clinics are astronomical and not covered by insurance. I took the median number of all of them & came to this 'goal'.
The number I have set is a rough and absolute guess decided with friends and family in knowing what is needed and for how long while still wanting to be attainable. 

I hope that instead of the goal needed, you might just ask yourself 'what can I do if I can do anything' and consider your good deed done even if you think it's nothing. To me, it'll never be nothing. We had to also bear in mind that 5% goes to this site for hosting.
If you cannot give anything, please do share.

I love you all. May my life be my message, as I have tried these years to impart in person and through my fine art & teaching.

And may the stars align for this and for my healing.
I have a long road ahead.
Please light candles, send reiki, say hello. 

With grace in my heart,
Ashley

Organizer

Ashley Lebedev
Organizer
Minneapolis, MN

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