Imagine yourself in Elena’s shoes. You live with your long-time partner Bobby, the love of your life, in a rugged, rurally isolated area. Once a rugged and robust man himself, he has cancer, but there’s been no definitive diagnosis of what kind and he hasn’t started treatment yet. You’ve been taking care of him the best you can. It’s been heart wrenching watching him waste away. It is January 21, the dead of winter.

 

Your mom, too, has cancer, and is now in the hospital. You’ve recently returned from visiting her…only to test positive for Covid yourself a few days later.

 

You ask Bobby’s mom, a retired nurse, to come to help with a tele-visit with Bobby’s doctor, who says to get him to the hospital ASAP. You are so grateful that she can follow the ambulance to the hospital and stay with him there while you are in quarantine.

 

In the hospital, Bobby, too, tests positive for Covid.

 

On January 24, you talk to your mom. She’s happy that you have Dufus the dog to keep you company. She calls you “Bunnyrabbit,” and you exchange “I love yous.”

 

The call comes early in the day on January 25 that she passed away at 4:25 a.m.

 

Then they discharge Bobby to hospice at his parents’ home. You are able to visit him on the 29th. He tells you, “You look pretty, and I’m going to see you again,” and you make plans to bring Dufus and Harley, the cat, to visit him.

 

But he is on heavy pain management medication, and not conscious most hours of the day. By January 31, he, too, has passed on. In one terrible week, you have become an orphan, and a widow.

 

Now there’s another blow to absorb: Bobby died without doing his will, and because you and he lived together for many years but never married, if there is an estate, it will not go to you. Washington does not recognize common law marriages.

 

And then another: your mother’s insurance policy, which she thought she’d set up to provide well for you, has small print that says it doesn’t cover natural causes or cancer.

 

Your mom’s car, the only running vehicle available to you, is under three feet of snow so it takes almost a month to get a ride to the single-wide that she has left you. It has been taken over by mice and packrats, is in urgent need of many repairs, and every inch is full of your mother’s worldly possessions. There isn’t even room to bring in a mattress, let alone your own belongings.

 

A few kind neighbors help you get gas for your mom’s Jeep, run errands, and do a dump run. It barely scratches the surface of the cleaning and clearing out that is needed before the place is inhabitable or the property is sellable. Your friend Jane calls daily for weeks, checks in with you to keep you sane, visits to help with chores and errands, but more recently is not able to visit in person.

 

So you are alone with Dufus the dog and Harley the cat, doing your best to take each day as it comes and sort through all the things that must be dealt with: the paperwork for cremation; changing titles on accounts and records; paying utility bills, arranging and paying for heating fuel, dump runs, car repairs; sorting your mother’s belongings; caring for your beloved animal companions Dufus and Harley; trying in the midst of your grief to plan for your future: researching social services and employment possibilities which are hard to get to because you are isolated and the price of gas prohibits doing much driving. It is overwhelming. Some days are worse than others.

 

Elena shares her struggle on Facebook. “I wanted death to find me. I prayed to whomever not to wake up in the morning. I even had a plan set out. But each morning I would wake up, each day I would have to let Dufus out, make sure Dufus and Harley had water and food. I would make sure the bills got covered somehow, someway. I made sure the dishes got done. Somedays I’m useless and I grieve again. Somedays I don’t want to talk to anyone and will shut down my cell phone or unplug the landline. Someday all I want to do is sleep, and somedays I still want death to find me, but I still wake up each morning…”

 

Other days, memories of her mom and of Bobby flood back. “Listening to George Jones, some of my mom’s old CD’s….I can almost see her dancing the 2 step. She tried to teach me a few times but I was hopeless.” “Hmmm, Just found an old text message from Bobby. ‘You are my Mind, Heart, and Soul’….Funny how I still remember that day.”

 

An old friend from high school days alerted other friends on Facebook of Elena’s plight, and now a group has come together to create this GoFundMe to help her get back on her feet.

 

Very recently, Elena wrote, “I want to thank those who have reached out to me and have helped me, many of you I haven’t seen or heard from in over 30+ years. I am grateful and humbled by your kindness. Grief can feel very lonely. Thank you again.”

 

Social media gets a lot of criticism these days, and a lot of it is earned. But it’s also one way we learn about friends in need, and come together to do something about it. Please join Friends of Elena with your donation. And please share this with your own friends on and off social media.

 

Elena needs…

· A dependable vehicle

· Money for all the household things food stamps can’t get you: dog and cat food, toiletries, household products, gas, heating fuel, dump runs, home repairs (including furnace and electrical work), a mattress to sleep on

· Funds to pay for her mother’s cremation

· Funds to pay her mother’s medical bills

· Funds to insure the single-wide she now lives in and the vehicle she drives

· Time to complete clearing out her mother’s things: sorting what to donate, what to toss, what to keep, what to give to her mother’s friends

· Time to heal; time to process her grief

 

https://www.gofundme.com/c/safety/gofundme-guarantee