My home was hit by a recent tornado, straight wind and hail, leaving me with $30,000.00 plus in damage and a long road to recovery. The storm caused serious harm to my roof, guttering, siding, fascia, soffit, deck, fence, chimney, front porch, corner front,and the area above my garage. While I am grateful to still be able to live in my home, the repairs needed are overwhelming and go far beyond what I ever expected to face.

As a disabled widow of a service-connected Veteran, this experience has been especially challenging. My husband and I belonged to and helped assuring we would be able to help veterans and families, widows and widowers of our service men and women. We were always active in supporting Veteran organizations and belonged to, VFW, DAV, Paralyzed Veterans, The Cooties POW MIA Color Guard, mortuary team and others, helping the homeless, missions, and assisting the elderly in our community and illiteracy. Do not be surprised if you find yourself with a disaster and do not expect help from veteran administration, post, or any other. I will continue to help veterans as I know what we use to do. FEMA, if you have insurance and you learn have a high deductible or any deductible you did not realize and is ridiculous to us they will not help you, and Do not depend on insurance to even send a letter to truly explain what they had done or the department of insurance allowed them to do. Had I known I would have replaced it.

Giving back was how we were raised, and asking for help now is truly a last resort. I have never asked for help It took me 11 weeks just to get a contractor to look at the damage to show up, because of the severe weather and back-to-back tornadoes in our area. I have spent months emailing and calling numerous organizations for help, using lists from the governor’s office and the Veteran Service Officer, google. I also completed an application with FEMA, but they do not assist with deductibles although a disaster and most places never even acknowledged my calls or emails. I understand there was a lot of destruction in our community, but it has made getting help even harder.

If you make it month to month you get no assistance. But if low income set by our government or are a renter you get help during a disaster. Do not misunderstand as I am not against anyone in need getting help! What about those of us in fixed income, having a hard time, paying taxes, being sure we have insurance? Those parents working to raise and provide needs? Having savings is a thing in the past for most of us especially with the economy. Yet good old USA gives billions to others in despair around the world.

I was shocked to learn that the deductible for the covered repairs alone is extremely high and need to raise a minimum of $10,980 deductible so work can start With the issues I know this is a difficult time for many people, and I appreciate any support and or for sharing my story with your contacts, and so forth as I do not know many people anymore. No donation is to small. Extreme heat and storms continue, and I hope to complete repairs soon. All the storms, heat and humidity over these last months and trying to get help have been exhaustive, now wood damaged areas are dry rotting.. My hope is to raise deductible to cover the costs of these repairs so it can begin to happen with getting started, and to get my home back to a safe and stable condition. Every contribution will go directly toward fixing the damage from this disaster. Thank you for taking the time to review my plea and for any help you can provide during this challenging time.

Thank You and God Bless!