Hello! Danielle and Rachel here, humbly asking for some help from our family and friends. Many of you know that the past almost 2 years of our lives have been a transformative whirlwind, marked by life changing realizations, exciting new beginnings, closed chapters, and opened doors. We wouldn’t change a single thing. We have been immensely lucky to find one another and become the family we are today, and all four of us have felt a joy we never had before each other. It truly has been magical in so many ways!

However, our fairy tale love has been accompanied by hardship after hardship. We’ve started and lost job after job due to a number of reasons including mistreatment, lack of hours, lack of a livable wage, jobs naturally coming to an end due to the nature of childcare and nannying, and disability/various health concerns. Both of us have been dealing with long Covid symptoms that has left Rachel with lung issues causing recurrent instances of bronchitis and pneumonia, and Danielle has been battling with hypertension and heart issues that has decreased her physical capacity on top of her existing chronic pain. We’ve also had Danielle’s car breakdown and eventually need replacing, as well as needing to replace Rachel’s after it was totaled when she was rear ended. Rachel’s new car is currently broken down and in need of a costly alternator repair, leaving us a one car family household. We also recently both lost work due to Hurricane Helene, and Danielle had to quit her job due to current health concerns making it too difficult for too little pay. She is exploring applying for Disability, but plans to find work as a substitute teacher or similar flexible job to accommodate her health needs and make her available for everyone’s needs while being a one car family.

Needless to say, financially we have been in shambles. We have been incredibly blessed with help from our loved ones, friends and family alike, and are forever grateful. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts to avoid it, our current home is facing foreclosure. Ian left us the home when he moved to Arizona, but due to our back to back financial setbacks, we have fallen significantly behind on the mortgage. We often had to choose food and gas over bills, because there simply was not enough for both and we had to prioritize our most urgent needs first. It has been an uphill battle, but financial recovery is finally on the horizon if we can just stabilize and start fresh.

Thankfully, we were able to find a company that buys homes like ours facing foreclosure and flips them for a significant profit. In exchange, we get to walk away from the home without a foreclosure impact on Ian’s credit, and we get a relocation allowance to get us into a new home. Unfortunately, there is much to figure out in a very short amount of time, and the relocation allowance will only be enough to cover first month’s rent and a security deposit and application and pet deposit fees.

Instead of relocating to somewhere in our current area, we decided to move from Georgia to Virginia where healthcare is better, more accessible, and there are more options for our wide range of health needs amongst the 4 of us. Virginia is also a blue/purple state, which will mean that we are significantly safer due to our extreme minority status being a gay interracial couple. We have faced increased discrimination, mistreatment, and heightened visibility and are unable to blend in where we currently live. Virginia is ranked in the top 10 states for Education, and is much more culturally diverse than where we are now. Bottom line, our unique family will have significantly increased safety, healthcare, education, and quality of life with a move to Virginia.

With that being said, we need help to pull this off. We are asking for help to cover the costs beyond those initial fees. We plan to sell some stuff to help, but we still need assistance. Any money we raise will directly go towards helping us with the following: any moving expenses including gas, lodging and storage if we cannot move in to a place right away, paying for any help we may need, and fixing Rachel’s car so that we can become a two car family again and significantly open up our options for employment. It will also go towards stocking our new home with food, toiletries, and other essentials, as well as cat carriers to safely transport our 4 cats across states, disposal service to remove large amounts of things we need to get rid of before a move, therapy for all of us through the transition, paying for bills until income from our new jobs kick in, and for filing for divorce between Ian and Danielle before leaving Georgia so that Rachel and Danielle can finally get married and secure their right to be recognized as family.

This is exactly the fresh start that we need, and we would be immensely grateful for anyone who is able to help. Even a $5 donation would be GREATLY appreciated, it adds up when enough people are willing to spare even that. Thank you in advance for any help at all, no donation is too small. ❤️