Jasmine's Story

At age 28, as a yoga instructor and mother to two young daughters ages 5 and 7, Jasmine was unexpectedly diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia in 2018, necessitating immediate treatment via emergency room admission. Meanwhile, her husband, now a Eugene police officer, lost his job because of the time he needed to take off of work to care for their girls.

Jasmine spent an entire year in the hospital fighting for her life.

Despite having good insurance coverage, Jasmine’s family rapidly depleted their savings. They had to cover unexpected hospital balance bills due to out-of-network physicians on her care team and to provide for their children. During this time, out-of-network physician balance bills went into collections without their awareness.

By the grace of God and persevering against medical odds, Jasmine had a highly successful bone marrow transplant and survived her battle with leukemia. However, Jasmine is still on expensive immunosuppressant and chemo treatments to treat Graft Versus Host Disease (GVHD) so that her body doesn’t reject the bone marrow transplant that saved her life. She also continues to suffer from liver and skin side effects from that medication, incurring further ongoing medical costs.


The Aftermath

Now Jasmine’s problems are largely financially-based from the aftermath of devastating medical expenses. Even with her husband being a hard-working police officer and defender of his community, her family has been left living from paycheck to paycheck. Jasmine still cannot return to teaching yoga due to the physical symptoms of GVHD limiting her mobility. As a result of the amount in collections, Jasmine and her husband are ineligible for a debt consolidation loan. She also tried to secure a payment plan through the hospital, but the $500 per month payments that they require are more than what she can afford.

The reality is that their income, with her husband serving their community as a police officer is barely enough to cover basic life expenses and ongoing medical costs. Due to this, they have not been able to rebuild their savings. Meanwhile, the $6,625 that landed in collections at the hands of our broken healthcare system prevents them from further financial opportunity and receiving loan approval for buying a home for their family.


Why We Should All Care

Jasmine's story could be any of ours. We don't know when a medical catastrophe can hit, and even with a well-paying full-time job and comprehensive insurance coverage, it does not guarantee that a middle-class family will be able to avoid life-derailing, seemingly inescapable medical debt.

Let's rally behind Jasmine and her family and contribute what we can spare to help them recover their lives and, in particular, provide the best possible future for their daughters. Please join us in paying it forward!