I was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer in Jan. 2018, just one week after my dear friend Flash died from brain cancer. My cancer is metastatic. It's in my lungs and also wrapped around the artery in the center of my liver where it's inoperable. I've also been told it's incurable, which I refuse to believe, so I continue to fight on with every fiber in my body. 

In September of 2018, work became too difficult for me so I went on long-term disability through an insurance company my previous employer provided.  I was approved to receive 60% of my former salary until retirement. Neat, right?! The insurance company also hired a lawyer to help me apply for Social Security disability which, once approved, would offset their total monthly payment. The process can take many months and the lawyer's fee was supposed to come out of the amount awarded by social security when it finally goes into effect.  I applied in Sept. 2018 and was finally approved last month which is actually pretty fast considering the amount of red tape. There was a 6 month waiting period for Social Security so payments didn't go into effect until Feb of this year. 

In March I received $8,000 back pay from Social Security for 3 months, however, the insurance company told me I owe $16,000 back to the insurance company for overpayments since October 2018. It feels odd to have to pay back twice as much as we received but they sent me a spreadsheet and the math is actually correct.

I was given 2 options by the disability company; 1) "guess" how much social security will provide and reduce my monthly insurance disability by that amount or take the full amount and payback anything that goes over. The lawyer recommended keeping the full amount instead of reducing the amount. I'm not sure why because now I see how awful that advice was.

I used to be able to just build a website or design another logo if I needed extra money. I undergo chemo every other week. It takes a huge toll on my brain function and physical levels of energy. There are many days where I don't have energy to leave my couch. I'm trying really hard to beat this disease but the level of stress over trying to pay back this money back is also weighing heavily on me. 

I've cut back on our expenses a lot so we can totally survive on the amount we receive but we're starting out so far behind that this extra $8,000 feels pretty daunting. I'm currently trying to sell our 30' RV to cover these costs but many friends in my community have asked how they can help. Relieving this debt would help me a lot!