Help me take care of a caregiver...

UPDATE #3: What a wonderful day (Thanksgiving) to give you the latest news!!! While speaking with the lady who was selling a (to all intents and purposes) new Inogene G5 portable oxygen concentrator, bless her heart, she reduced the amount even more from $600 to $500 and paid the postage too! Peggy is now in receipt of the Inogene G5. We had a moment of worry when it didn’t specify it provided continuous flow but Peggy spoke with the customer representative and, while it isn’t expressly continuous flow, there is a workaround. Plus apparently the machine will take about a week of use before it “learns” her breathing pattern. So I just want to take this opportunity to tell you “thank you” for your caring and generosity. Peggy and I are so very grateful to you. I am going to leave this GoFundMe up at least for a while because, while the primary goal was to get the portable oxygen machine, Peggy’s medical bills continue to accrue and what has not been used to purchase the machine will definitely come in handy. Again, thank you, and God’s blessings to you this holiday season and beyond.

UPDATE #2: I am in talks with a lady who has exactly what Peggy needs and is willing to accept $600 for it! That means we are more than 1/2 there to getting an Imogene Portable Oxygen Condenser. PRAYERS PLEASE!

 UPDATE: I’m told that I need to get more swiftly to the point of this plea for help so I am going to summarize in a paragraph and if you want the details, just keep reading. ;-)

Short version: Peggy was caregiver for my mother. When she couldn’t work anymore due to her health problems, she became our very dear friend. In fact, she is more like family to me than my remaining family of origin. She helped me immeasurably when I lost my Mom almost two years ago. Now Peggy has been given a diagnosis of lung cancer and needs a portable oxygen concentrator. Please help me help this caregiver!!!

By the way, I changed the photo from one of generic lungs to a picture Peggy had taken of me and Mom when I said I missed Mom’s hugs. It was hard to hug around her walker or while she was seated. Peggy made me pose with Mom to take the pic and unbeknownst to me, had it made into a wall hanging with a poem for Mom to give me. 

Long version: Please grab yourself a cup of cocoa or coffee and get comfortable before reading this. I can’t promise to be brief. My name is Kathy Gwizdala, and while this GoFundMe request is for someone else, I need to provide a little backstory. I was a family caregiver for my parents during their last years – which meant to me, more than 20 years. My Dad passed away on 08/15/2006 after about a decade of dementia. My Mom passed away on 12/26/2021 after more than another decade of needing care. Most of the time, I was working full time, raising two children, and TRYING to meet my parents’ needs as well. The kids and I had moved from my house, back to our family home to be there for Mom as she tried to deal with Dad’s changing condition. He had “sundown syndrome” so that meant many sleepless nights. Needless to say, this took a toll on me over the years – physically and emotionally. After Dad passed, the kids and I stayed with Mom because I just couldn’t imagine her living alone in her big house. Then, during a trip to Mom’s Indiana family home, on 01/01/2010, she fell and shattered the bone in her arm. Mom’s needs shifted abruptly to full care.

Enter the steady stream of caregivers. Mom’s first paid caregiver was quite memorable. We referred to her “fondly” as “Nurse Ratchet.” I should have shown her the door sooner, but I was petrified that I would inadvertently do something that would hurt Mom, I had to work and take care of the kids and was nothing short of desperate. Eventually, we did move on, but the stream of exceedingly unremarkable and downright negligent caregivers came and went…until the woman about whom this GoFundMe is for. She didn’t just raise the bar; she redefined the bar for what a caregiver could and should be.

I remember seeing Peggy’s ad on Care.com and her relative proximity to our home. I remember feeling numb or fatalistic about contacting her and arranging for an interview. By that time, I felt like an automaton, just going through the motions, convinced that this is just another paid caregiver who might give me a day, a week or a month before her attention went elsewhere or we found her intolerable. She arrived – on time, no less – for the interview. She was bold, confident, and animated. In fact, I would say she was a bit intimidating to me. But she was a warm body, and even more, she had relevant experience. HIRED!

Peggy showed up on time every day she was scheduled. She rarely took a day off. She would make arrangements with me beforehand if she did need to leave early or take a day off. She adjusted her schedule if we needed her to and she could. She even came for extended/overnight stays so my husband and I could get away. But what I remember the most was coming home early one day and realizing that I had started smiling to myself. Given my bone-numbing fatigue and overall emotional state, that was highly unusual. I was surprised. So why was I smiling to myself? Well, I overheard Peggy and Mom from Mom’s apartment, laughing and talking to each other. It sounded like they were having a blast! Peggy had this belly laugh that was so infectious and hearing Mom laugh, having genuine fun was a soothing balm to my beaten spirit. I frequently felt inadequate in filling Mom’s emotional needs due to my own fatigue and I could see Peggy filling that void.

Over time I would see the many “extras” that Peggy brought to the table – too many to truly recount. She would regale Mom with stories about her children and grandchildren. She would decorate Mom’s apartment both with Mom’s seasonal decorations and even with items she would pick up from her “garage sale-ing.” She would take Mom shopping and they would recount their adventures with me – like when Peggy tried to teach Mom how to use the motorized shopping thing-a-ma-bob. Apparently, Mom got confused about how to stop the thing, pressing her foot on the invisible brake rather than using the hand controls – resulting in some very near misses. They laughed so hard telling me about it, I couldn’t help but join in. Peggy cleaned up and decorated the back patio so they could go outside and enjoy the sunshine together. It was just one of those things that I should have done but just didn’t have the time or energy. She would make snacks and meals to put in the fridge so Mom could have her favorites available when Peggy was off. She would also visit Mom occasionally on her days off and tell Mom that coming to see her was like coming to her “sanctuary.” She would ask Mom for advice and convey to Mom, in many ways, just how special and wanted she was. Mom wasn’t just a job. I remember once in an emergency; I called Peggy for help, and she ran over, still in her pajamas. Peggy also extended her kindness to me as well. She became a sounding board for me and gave me ideas about how to deal with some of my challenges. As time passed, we all became very close. At some point, Mom “adopted” Peggy and she became my “sister-from-another-mother-and-father…” Then came the sad day when Peggy had to stop working due to her health problems. She remained involved with Mom through visits and FaceTime calls until nearly the very end.

Now Peggy, my sister-from-another-mother-and-father, has been diagnosed with lung cancer. She needs continuous oxygen, 24/7, at 3 liters. Her medical bills are amassing, and she is feeling overwhelmed – she is acutely aware of the battle she is facing. This just hurts my heart. She has one medication for which she must pay $271 and another $150 monthly – and those are just the most expensive ones. She has several other ones as well. And her battle with cancer started even before her husband, Frank’s, battle with another kind of cancer ended. Thankfully, his cancer is in remission now, but their savings have been, to all intents and purposes, exhausted.

Peggy was with me through a large bulk of my caregiving challenges. I felt depleted so much of the time and she kept providing me with her steady stream of emotional support. She continued to be there for me as my “sister” while I mourned the loss of my Mom. Despite having pulmonary issues and a compromised immune system, she came to the funeral home in the midst of the Covid ordeal with her mask on to say her goodbyes to Mom and give me a hug. She mourned right along with me. She was more emotionally present for me than any of the family members with whom I was raised. Now I want to help her. She shouldn’t be in this alone.

Peggy has a large oxygen machine that “tethers” her to an electrical outlet and tubing. This limits her mobility terribly. She loves to go outside and be in the sunshine. The last time she got ready to go to a doctor’s appointment, her oxygen had dropped to 87 with a heart rate of 144 before she even left the house. I looked on Google and it said: “If you’re using an oximeter at home and your saturation level is 92% or lower, call your healthcare provider. If it is at 88% or lower, get to the emergency room as soon as possible.” My hope is that, at a minimum, with your help (friends and strangers alike), we can get her a portable oxygen machine and maybe some money to go towards her medical bills.

There is an Inogen One G5 Portable Oxygen Concentrator with two batteries (a small and a large) that will power it up to 14 hours for a total of $2,564.00. Now, because Peggy needs continuous flow oxygen, it won’t last nearly 14 hours, but with two she could charge one battery while using the other. This model has the capacity for continuous flow unlike many other models and it goes as high as 6 liters. She only needs 3 right now but it is better to have more than you need than not enough. I have tried many other routes to get an oxygen condenser to meet her needs but have come up against one brick wall after another.

Peggy has always been a strong, resilient woman who was caregiver to others and being on the other side is difficult for her. It took some doing to convince her to let me post on here. But I can tell you from many years of personal experience, we all need help sometimes -- and over the years, she was that to me. Most of us, most of the time, take breathing for granted and having oxygen to breathe should not be so expensive and hard to find. But for her, it really is. So, like the saying, “many hands make light work,” if many can help just a bit, we might be able to do this. If nothing else, whatever is offered can go towards medical bills. I’m setting the goal for $5,000 but would be happy beyond words to get enough to cover the oxygen compressor. Please help me care for this caregiver.

Thank you.