Doom relief fund: Vandy Hall and Chris Epperson

Covid-19. The death of a beloved pet. Months of medical treatments. Ambulance and emergency room fees. A refrigerator dying and plumbing backing up. These are just a few of the disasters that have hit Vandy and Chris over the last several months. This fund is to help them pay back expenses and get back on their feet.

On June 9th, in the early hours of the morning, after several months of ill fortune, disaster once more struck Vandy Hall, Chris Epperson, and their household. After a day of cuddling in bed with their other kitty, Their beloved cat Dante suddenly started suffering concerning symptoms. He fell over while getting out of bed, could barely stagger, showed no interest in food or pets, and had severe cognitive difficulties. Dante needed to go to the emergency vet, but Vandy, Chris, their friend Cat (who was quarantining with them), and Vandy’s parents who live next door, had all been struck by Covid-19 within the last few days. A family friend, Marcus, came to the rescue, agreeing to take Dante to the emergency vet, despite it being 12:30 am on his birthday morning. While waiting for Marcus to arrive, Chris suddenly started suffering from terrifying medical symptoms: he had problems breathing, his face was pallid and his lips turned blue, sweat poured down his face, he became disoriented, and he started to lose consciousness several times. Vandy called 911, and Cat tried to calm Chris down and help him remain conscious. While waiting for the paramedics to arrive, Marcus showed up, collected Dante, and left for the emergency vet, shortly followed by the paramedics, who transported Chris to the closest emergency room.

Chris was the victim of a sudden and severe panic attack, and came home safe and sound later that morning.

Dante was less fortunate. He had suffered a brain event of unknown type. Later that morning, while waiting for Vandy to make a decision about further treatment, Dante suffered another severe event, became unresponsive, and he never came home.

Those are the most recent in a series of terrible events befalling the Hall & Epperson household. In January 2022, following some extreme workplace mis-management at his new job, seasonal depression, and a betrayal of a close friend, Chris started having attacks of intense anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation. Chris’s condition became extreme enough to make him non-functional including keeping him from working, and it took months of trying different medication, therapy, and over a month of intensive outpatient therapy for him to mostly recover. Chris just accepted a new job offer when he caught Covid. During that time Vandy did her best as the sole bread-winner in the household, but because of her disabling migraines and other health problems and the lack of regular shows at which she typically sells her artwork, she wasn’t able to keep up with daily expenses. They had long since run through their savings. And a streak of bad luck has been continuously hitting them with additional unexpected expenses ranging from the death of their refrigerator to sudden plumbing malfunctions, flooding them with debt.

Things have been difficult since the beginning of September when Pandemic Unemployment Assistance ended. Chris was seasonally laid off from his job as a heavy equipment operator when the pandemic began in 2020, and was unable to find work until November of 2021. Vandy is self-employed as an artist and maker, and became functionally unemployed once large public events ceased being held because of the pandemic. Though PUA ended last September, there were still almost no opportunities for her to sell her work at shows for the rest of the year, and only in the last few months have shows begun to occur with more regular frequency.

During Vandy’s second show of the year, over this Memorial Day weekend, both Vandy and Chris caught Covid-19. Chris has been recovering well, and has begun training at his new job, but Vandy continues to suffer major symptoms from the virus and is currently unable to work. Vandy has several auto-immune disorders which put her in the high-risk category for Covid-19, and while she’s hoping for a swift recovery, she’s uncertain how long it will be until she is functional.

Additionally Vandy needs to apply for fall & winter shows so she can hopefully get her business up and running again once she recovers.

Our goal is to raise $10,500 which will hopefully cover Chris’s medical treatment bills, the estimated hospital and transport costs from Chris’s ER trip, veterinary expenses from Dante’s trip to the emergency vet, money borrowed to cover emergency expenses, a few weeks of living and operating expenses, and any extra will go towards helping cover costs for at least one of the larger upcoming shows at which Vandy hopes to have a booth.

Thank you so much for your time and attention. These unforeseen expenses have been a real strain on Vandy's and Chris's well-being and any small contribution will surely be a big weight off of them. Every little bit truly does help, including sharing this page if you're so inclined!