Help for Kate and Penelope

UPDATE:

I just found out that I was denied Social Security Disability Insurance because my cancer is “not severe enough.” My doctors do not believe that I will be able to work until sometime in 2025. I have had to increase the amount I am fundraising for, as I am terrified that I will not be able to put a roof over Penelope’s head and food on our table before I can get a job. Please, please consider helping us. Bills are mounting, I am so sick (right now I have walking pneumonia on top of cancer,) I need help. I wouldn’t ask if it were not completely dire.

On January 7, 2024 I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Exactly a week later, I was laid off of my job as a Senior Brand and Content Writer at a Chicagoland technology company as part of a departmental reorganization. (Though I find it a little bit sus that 6 days after I disclosed my diagnosis to HR that I was added to the layoff list when I was not previously on it, but I digress.)

Since then I have had 1 lumpectomy and 1 tissue excision to try to remove the cancer that have been unsuccessful. My original diagnosis was invasive ductal carcinoma +H2/-HER2. Since then I have learned that I have micro metastatic cancer throughout my left breast and lymph nodes. They also cannot tell me if I have micro metastatic in my right breast, as it has not formed a tumor yet.

I am currently scheduled for a bilateral mastectomy on Friday, 3/15 — followed by 20 weeks of chemotherapy starting on Thursday, 4/11.

It has been a really terrible start to 2024.

As part of my layoff I was extended employee rate health benefits for 10 weeks after my release date, which are quickly coming to an end, after which I will be left with no medical coverage. I also currently owe about $2k in co-pays, an amount that will only increase as I have additional procedures, tests, treatments. Because of this diagnosis I do not have the ability to find, secure, and onboard to a new position before my severance ends. Further, my doctors have advised that due to a pre-existing autoimmune disorder, it will probably take me 12 months to fully recover once treatment is finished.

I currently have applications in for unemployment, SSI disability, Medicaid, Illinois All Kids (for Penelope,) and SNAP benefits. But those applications take time to process, and even once benefits start, I am really anxious that I will be able to cover my existing bills and expenses. (As we all know that government assistance programs aren't very good in our country.)

I have a lot of wonderful family and friends who have helped me with some out of pocket expenses, meals, and in purchasing medical supplies I'll need after my surgery and during chemotherapy... but I am still worried about supporting my daughter, Penelope.

Kids are super expensive, as we know. If it was just me that I was considering, I likely would not be asking for help at all. But, my daughter doesn't deserve to have her quality of life interrupted any more than it has been because I am sick.

I have added up my existing medical debt from the cancer, added a couple of months of COBRA insurance coverage (incase my Medicaid is not approved by the time my benefits run out,) and added a partial amount of general expenses to get me and Penelope through until December — and, that is how I came up with the estimated amount that I need to fundraise.

Any help you could give us would be so appreciated. Anyone who knows me will confirm that I HATE asking for financial help, but these are very unusual circumstances. I will do anything and everything possible to get healthy to be here for Penelope and I will do anything and everything possible to ensure that she has the life she deserves. Thank you so much in advance for considering a donation. I promise that I will pay it forward once I am well and have the means to do so.