The picture above is the last time Alyssa's teeth looked nice, altho even then they were degrading. Demitria and Alyssa are working together to make this happen.  Demitria wrote the following appeal:
(TL;DR at the bottom but we recommend you read the full story)


Alyssa and I have been friends for about 5 years now :] She’s seen me through thick and thin, helped me grow as a person in more ways than I can count, and has brought a magnitude of positivity, support, and accountability to every music scene she’s touched since she moved here. It’s impossible to put into words… she’s a better friend than I could ever imagine up to have in my life. I don’t call her my sister lightly. I love that lady more than the sky is blue and summer days are long. I’ve honestly never met anyone so honest and receptive, and invested in doing things the right way, as long as they are worth doing. I love that she makes herself laugh as much as the rest of us. She creates generosity and playfulness for herself first. She does it so beautifully, It all shines outwards. Brilliant. Even evolutionarily. Her joy and passion for art, her community, and living life is catalytic. She is so courageously determined to be happy and to take us all with her. And here I have found myself along for the ride, with someone who always keeps me safe. <3.


Anyway that’s my best friend :] And we talk about everything :] But something we have not talked about much, is how realistic it is to get her teeth fixed.


Life in San Francisco costs enough month to month and Alyssa has found it practically impossible to save for a week off, let alone the kind of heavy-duty dental work that she needs. She lives payday to payday, gig to gig, so she just deals with it as it is. On a good day, there is minimal pain and her confidence expands to the point that she’s giving 70% of her best self (by her approximation). On a bad day, when the pain becomes unbearable, when she is extremely self-conscious about how she looks, or when she’s stressing over the risk of that the multiple abscesses she has might go to her brain or heart and kill her, she is only running at 10%, maybe less, and functions as a pale shadow of herself. She’s had to leave work from pain, or just smiled through it even though she was hurting. I hate that I can’t help. She hates that its a thing that gets in the way of her happiness and success.


I know we all love Alyssa and want her at 100% as often as possible. Life has so much to offer a woman like this, and when we fix this one thing that holds her back from meal to meal (like she’s had to be extremely careful when eating, sticking to softer foods for the past several years), and keeps her from giving her all socially, professionally, and emotionally. She handles better than anyone could be expected to.


So a couple of weeks ago I’m chilling in Twitterverse like I do, trying not to feed the trolls or whatever, and the homie slides into the DM’s. Her homie, not my homie. Dude expressed how much of a difference he felt it would make if she just had the money to handle this. I agreed and told him I’ve always wished I could help her with this, and that together she and I have looked at it from all angles. 


We decided that we didn’t have the resources to leave the country for the operations, as it's hard enough to take time from work which will further costs and risk her immediate house and home. Additionally, there is always the risk of something going wrong, and if it does we definitely can’t afford to leave the country again and again to take care of secondary operations, fixing mistakes, or worst-case scenario, going to court. 


She tried using regular MediCal to help with this, but that insurance only covers extractions and recommends the cheaper option of dentures, and frankly, she is too young to want or be interested in getting dentures. She’s not even 30 - too young to do something so drastic as pulling out all her remaining teeth for something that detaches from her mouth, and never looks truly natural. Additionally, they can’t be used as a stop-gap measure until implants are more affordable because once the teeth are removed so is the structure needed to insert the implants.  I explained to him that, at this point, it’s a “keep buying a lotto ticket now and then and pray we get lucky” situation. Even dentures are considered a mostly cosmetic cost, so insurance is next to useless.


He said that made sense. And then he made an incredible offer. 


He offered to pay $15,000, almost half the cost to get her a permanent, natural-looking set of implants, under two conditions. Firstly, she’s agreed to a payment plan to return $10,000 of it, with the expectation of at least  $1000 every year for the next ten years. Secondly, she’s quitting smoking cigarettes which she’s gone over two weeks without.


So, yea. Fifteen mother-fucking thousand dollars. One big lump of a starting point.         


LikeForFuckingReal.


I was like, “HOLY SHIT BALLS, BATMAN, the universe actually WANTS this to happen.” So I told Alyssa. And she was like “LoL Ya Rite..believe that when I see it.” Understandable skepticism considering many have promised to help her over the years and balked at the costs for all the work she needs.


I decided to look into exactly what the total cost would be. I never realized how much it takes to fix this. Maxillofacial surgery, bone grafts, extraction, installation, molding/ crafting fees and much more.  I had never bothered to look so closely before, and I was shocked to see what it would take but determined to figure it out. So I researched different offices in the area, visited a couple solo, and chose one for us to visit together. 


After weighing options and going over the exact expenses from every angle, we met with a doctor that we like and trust here in San Francisco. Working with his office, we’ve come up with a flat number and a definitive plan to move forward. She is getting her entire upper teeth replaced with implants and a couple in her lower jaw as well. Lo and behold, our benefactor’s help will pay entirely for the first procedure in which the dentist will install a temporary set of teeth while her gums and jaw heal around the implants. It will cover extractions, bone grafting, X-rays, creating a temporary bridge, and restoration of her remaining teeth (which are stronger and less damaged than we were worried they might be). It would pay for the implants that hold the bridges in place. Those implants would then would heal into her jaw bone over four months.


After these four months, another procedure will take place to install permanent, hand-crafted implants. They’re going to build them to look extremely realistic; our doctor is described as an artist :) They will use photos of what her smile from the past so that it's truly imperceptible that she’s had work done. We were honestly blown away by before and after photos of other patients and the office staff was so excited to help someone young and beautiful, as their usual patients can only afford these things later in life.



And this is where you come in. 


We’re trying to fundraise for the second half of the process which we have to pay for on our own. It’s another single-day procedure to install the permanent hand-crafted teeth. The $15,000 from our benefactor takes us a long way, almost halfway. Now we just have to come up with another $21,000.


Just $21,000, no biggie LMAO.


So ya girl sat down with a pad of paper and took a big adult-y look at her finances, her plans for the next year, and how much belt-tightening she can afford to swing some of this herself, and I’ve decided.


 I’ve got $4,000 on it. 


I have no kids you know. My housing is stable. I can sell some paintings I have no space for. I can bite the bullet on $4g’s and not hate myself for blowing my savings.


Which brings our magical number to $17,000. We need to create $17g’s by February, to cover the final costs of the procedures. We need your help to make this happen for her. I can’t think of anyone more deserving to fulfill their potential and endless ambition. I want her to live the last 6 months of her twenties as someone who is comfortable smiling and eating. I don’t want her to flinch every time she looks in the mirror, or feel like she will only ever make it to the second interview, but never get the job she wants. I want her to rocket past me in her accomplishments and capabilities, the way I feel she is meant to.


So please, can you help? :)


We’re hoping there will be a few of you angels who can afford donate $1000 or more to help make a bigger dent in this, but if that’s way beyond your reach a hundred dollars will go a long way as well. FUCK we would be SO grateful for ANYTHING you can give, and I know Alyssa would be the most grateful. Big donations can also go directly into my Venmo, so we can avoid some of the fees that sites like this take from the total.


We’re both looking to pick up as many gigs as we can, I am specifically looking for a day or night time gig on Tuesdays and Thursdays as I’m really invested in setting aside as much money as I can for this, and we’re willing to fill our days off with any kind of random work for the foreseeable future.

We’re aware that we have a lot of talented artist homies, and living as an artist in the bay his expensive, so if a large cash donation is out of reach for you, we’re working on a couple of different events to help fundraise. Do you have something you can contribute to a silent auction of sorts (i.e. art, gift certificates, apparel, etc), or a skill you’d like to donate to an event (particularly DJ sets as we know what to do with those but we’re very open-minded as to the types of events we’ll put together), or a venue to host us for these gatherings? Let us know so we can start plans to make this happen!


Because we’re pulling this off, Alyssa will have her temporary set of teeth to visit her family for Christmas. She hasn’t seen her family in person in five years, since her grandma died, so not exactly a happy occasion. It’s going to be amazing that she can smile with them, laugh with them, and assure them she is well-loved and quickly improving the quality of her life.


So let's invest in the future of our little blonde bombshell. Let's give back to the white witch who has blessed our lives with so much magic. Let's come together and support someone who has bent over backward to support so many of us. She always does her best. Let's do our best for her :]


Thanks :]

-Demitria


TL;DR - Alyssa is getting dental implants because her health and confidence has been deteriorating along with her teeth for the last ten years. The total estimated cost is $36,000. With the help of a loan of $15,000 from an anonymous benefactor, along with Demitria contributing $4,000 to the cause, the total to be raised is $17,000. She will have two surgeries, the first being in early October, and we need to raise as much as we can before her second operation in February. Anything helps and we are eternally grateful for all support, but we're suggesting an average donation of $50-$100 to make a real impact. Details on the plan and choices are above, please read it to understand the full story and to see other ways you can help! <3