Help Yaneris Restore Her Vision

The Diagnosis

 

After months of searching for the cause of inexplicable pain and vision loss, Yaneris was finally diagnosed in October 2021 with Papilledema in both eyes and Intracranial Idiopathic Hypertension (IIH), a rare disorder that affects the brain.

 

Doctors found significant damage to Yaneris' optic nerve and despite multiple procedures and medication regimes, her sight continued to degrade to the point of near total blindness. As a result, she was rushed into brain surgery on January 17th to save what vision remained. She is currently stable but it is too soon to tell if the surgery was a success, and further neuro-ophthalmological treatment and procedures will continue.

 

Although we are confident in her medical team, the road to full healing will be long and uncertain.

 

 

 

 

Why We Need Your Help

 

Along with the physical pain and stress that this has caused Yaneris, it has also put her and her partner under enormous financial pressure. The bills for medication, visits to specialists, extensive testing and surgeries continue to grow.

 

Yaneris is an artist, illustrator and graphic designer and can no longer serve her clients, many of whom are feminist and social justice NGOs that she has worked with for decades. In addition to Yaneris' loss of income, her partner’s ability to work has been reduced in order to help Yaneris with daily activities and navigating medical care and appointments.

 

 

 

More about Yaneris

 

Yaneris Gonzáles Gómez is a longtime Dominican artist and social justice activist. She has lived under multiple oppressions and identities: being a woman, lesbian, black and poor. Yaneris has created from a place of resistance, from her experience as belonging to a rural and marginalized community, from her own survival. She has published her graphic design in calendars and issues of HIV, women’s rights, violence and safe abortions, black women's resistance, among others. 

 

 

 

 

Yaneris has helped innumerable people through her organizing and her art and we hope you will join us in helping her.

 

Thanks in advance for your support!

 

~ Camila (Yaneris' partner) and a team of friends