Fund Raising for Jayde

This is Jayde, she is a beautiful 23 year old young lady that I have known for the last 20 years. I am starting this page to help Jayde to be able support her with some funding for her up coming medical appointments and the tube feeding supplies to keep her healthy until a more permanent solution is found. We are unsure how long this may take.

Jayde has been diagnosed with the rare condition Median Arcuate Ligament Syndrome (MALS), which has lead to a second condition Superior Mesenteric Artery Syndrome (SMA), as well as Nutcracker Syndrome. Doctors also suspect that Jayde has Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome which may be the reason for all of these conditions. She has been referred to another specialist for more testing and diagnosis. These conditions have significantly impacted Jayde’s daily life, causing chronic pain, nausea, vomiting, bloating and reflux, restricting her diet to liquids and foods of smoothie consistency to help prevent blockages that may lead to hospitalisation. Her restrictive diet has led to a loss of over 25% of body weight in 18 months, and Jayde’s weight has continued to drop.

Jayde now has a nasojejunal tube for feeding which runs for 16 hours per day. Over the past 12 months, she has spent $18,000 (yes, eighteen thousand) on her health with doctors appointments, specialist appointments, testing, medications and now tube feed supplies. Jayde is currently self-funding these expenses and has had to continue working full-time due to the high costs associated with specialist appointments, medications, and upcoming medical supplies. As you can imagine, working full time is a struggle for Jayde given her poor health and the disabling symptoms she has been experiencing over an extended period of time.

Unfortunately Jayde is ineligible for financial support with any of the costs due to being “stuck in the gap” of what determines the difference between disability and chronic illness. Her family have been an incredible support, but she needs to prepare financially for future medical expenses including specialist appointments, medical tests, likely surgery and essential nutritional supplies, as well as time off work to allow her to recover from medical procedures.

Since starting her nasojejunal tube feeds, Jayde’s weight is slowly increasing and specialists seem to be getting closer to figuring out a plan to help longer term, but Jayde cannot afford to continue attending expensive specialist appointments or purchasing essential medicines and nutritional supplies without financial support.