Help Charlette live well

This fundraiser is for my best friend Charlotte. It's been over a year since I asked her if I could do this. For so long she said no, she is ultra independent even when it's hard. Just that she is letting me do this says a lot.

I thought of what I want to share about my friend. I could tell this glowing story about how things are so well until cancer. But that wouldn't be the real story behind me asking for help on behalf of my friend. It isn't unicorns and fairytales for most of us, certainly not Charlotte.

Charlotte doesn't ask for help, because no one was there to answer the call for so long. Living a life where you don't have another choice will do that to a person. Charlotte was raised in abuse. Long after the abuse ended, the impact on family goes on. Her family wasn't there to pick up the pieces, or fill in the gaps. To fight for her, to help her, to encourage her to heal. It was her own voice that had do that for her. Her own choices. She didn't have someone to pick her up, so she pulled herself up by her boot straps. Many years later she became a nurse. Being a nurse wasn't about changing everything for her. It was the outcome of the changes that took place inside. Being a nurse didn't make her a better person, but it became the lampstand to a light inside of her.

Charlette would go on trying to make the world a little easier for everyone else but not really knowing what it was like to be around people who loved her or who were willing to do the same for her. She loved anyway. She learned to love by learning what love isn't and going from there. Learning the limits of how to treat people well because she knew what it felt like not to be treated so well and didn't want anyone else to feel that way.

If I didn't know her so well I would have no idea the mountains she climbed. She has this way of being so solid for people when things are hard. People lean on her more than she leans on anyone. There are so many hard moments as nurses. So often things were stressful. When we loose a patient they train us not to connect inside because the losses are hard. They say "don't take it home with you". I can remember the names of every patient we lost. Everytime even if we weren't even at the same job I could call her and she wouldn't give me the lecture about how we aren't supposed to let it bother us. She just grieved with me. There are hard moments of wondering if we could have done something different, something better to prevent someone's health from declining. Charlette would review charts with me well into the night and early in the morning. My patients and hers too so that we could learn to be better at what we do. No matter how good we think we are, we still learn. When I was beating my own brains out asking how or why something went wrong she didn't try to convince me it wasn't my job or my fault. She just knew I needed to find a way to go above and beyond. Charlotte knew because thats what she does too. Watching people get sick and doing nothing just isn't the way she is made. That's why she is my best friend. Because people matter to her. No matter what. They matter.

For years Charlotte spent treating patients and walking their families thru it too. Thru cancers, infections, kidney disease, liver failure, wounds. She walked with them, but she walked alone too. It was never about the job for her. It was always about the people, her heartbeat for them. For one patient, her heartbeat when insurance didn't cover what they needed. Insurance said no, so Charlette bought it herself. For another patient, her heartbeat was caring for the patient who was ill and his wife too. So many hours, so many days, she would be on the phone with his wife training her what to do, listening to her exhaustion, grief, goofiness. Being there for her and him alike. It was about the people, not the job.

During that time, Charlotte had a tumor growing inside. Soon it was her on the other side of the bed rail. Her cancer is in her intestines. Multiple surgeries later, chemo, radiation, and soon stem cell treatment to come with more surgery, she is finally letting me do this for her. Some days she tries to hide how sick she is. Not wanting anyone to see her like that. Not wanting to feel like giving up, crying, or putting any of the mountains she carries on anyone. My best friend doesn't have a family to back her. Help her. To fill in the gaps. The world we live in is so harsh to those without families that support them. It's so easy to get lost in that gap. As if because a parent thought their child didn't matter, no one else does either. We are taught to rely on family. To be reliable. Charlotte has been reliable. She learned not by being taught but by the experience of not having that.

Right now, my best friend is fighting for her own life. No one else would. So she did. But she needs help. She has given so much, more than most have to give. She gives more of herself, her heart, her time, and her money than she ever asks for from anyone. Not wanting to harm anyone or bug anyone, or be a burden of any sort. There are many things that got lost in having no family. Many things she won't ever get to experience that so many others do. Knowing someone will be there to hold her hand after surgery. She might not get to experience knowing what it is like to have someone say she matters every day. There is something that she can experience in this world that she hasn't, though.

If even for a moment, the world could take the time to give back just a little to get her thru this. She is facing losing her apartment and doesn't know where to go. Her bills are piling up since she can't work at the moment. I have offered my home, but I have small school-aged kids and with chemo, that is a huge risk of her getting super sick from something that could be a small as a common cold for the rest of us.

She doesn't have a family to call to live with and has been out of work off and on for over a year. If the world could just help her hold on to what she has that would be great. It would be good enough. For many out there it may seem so insignificant to help a stranger. Like it isn't worth much. Last week she told me it was difficult to eat and she could only hold in crackers. I decided to bring her some more crackers and juice and dips for her crackers. I want to do so much more for her. I thought is wasn't a big deal too. Later she called me in tears so humbled because she has been that rock for everyone but never had anyone do that for her. It matters. It makes a huge statement.

They say shoot for the moon, and even if you miss, you land among the stars. This world didn't show my friend she was welcome here. In the beginning, sometimes that is the way our stories start. I am asking to give her a different ending. For the better part of her life that was her story. Abuse was her beginning. I am asking this world to give her a new story. One that says her life matters and she is worthy of the little we can give back. A story that people care for her too in ways like what she has done so many times for so many people. A story that lets her know she is welcomed in this world.

Charlette has insurance, it isn't the medical bills that are starving her out right now. It's making sure she can have a home to be sick in..... A place to rest her head.... To heal in even if it doesn't mean healing the way I want her to heal in. In her heart and in her body is what I pray for, but most importantly in her heart. Recovering from illness isn't just about the body healing, its an opportunity to heal old wounds that are inside too. I am asking this world to hold the space a family didn't. To help her hold on to what she worked so hard for.

Here is the medical info on her cancer:

A couple years ago they found a tumor in her colon that was too big to operate on. They treated her with chemo and radiation to shrink it so they could operate. The chemo and radiation needed to treat it would be too long and too hard on anyone's body so they went that route. She had the tumor removed and we thought it was clear but it came back fast.

She has had I think 2 more surgeries since. More rounds of chemo and rad. And is now going for stem cell treatment which is supposed to be better than radiation for this kind of cancer. Her surgery is at the end of the month and her apartments are amazing and have worked with her giving grace but without being able to work she doesn't have a way to sustain things.

Her last surgery was especially difficult as we weren't sure what would happen when she woke up. There was a chance she would need an ostomy depending on the margins. That means that the area of intestines around the tumor could have cancer cells so they cut out the perimeter until the margins are cancer free. She was exceptionally lucky to wake up and not have an ostomy but it was very touch and go and the surgery took much longer than most.

At this point if the stem cells don't work, they will need to take her intestines and give her the ostomy. Right now the pain from the cancer and repeated surgeries is so bad most days she can't eat or get out of bed. She normally helps care for her grand-daughter but with recent chemo and covid the risk of her getting sick from covid or anything really could be detrimental for her. Her immune system is shot and every time she has to go for another procedure they make her isolate from family and friends to avoid her getting sick.

On top of the pain she has lost so much weight. Right now she doesn't even look the same. Getting food in her is a challenge. Most days the nausea is so bad crackers are all she can keep in. She does try to eat even when she is nauseated and can't hold it in but it's challenging to find things she can tolerate.

They are doing the stem cell treatment at the end of the month which is another surgery. 2/28. After that they are going to try hyperbaric chamber to help her heal. She needs help now getting caught up on bills and to sustain things for several months after.