Wednesday, July 16th 2025, was probably the scariest day we have had in the last 2 1/2 years. On Wednesday, Jen went to the office and was able to work. She physically and mentally felt better than she had in so long. She truly felt like she was starting to get better and was more confident in her health.

Around 9 pm Jen started feeling extremely dizzy, when she wasn’t dizzy everything was blurry. Her chest was pounding,she kept fainting, her body was on fire. She thought she was having a stroke or a heart attack. We had a close by amazing family member (Love you Grace) who ran over and with our neighbors help me get her to the er. From what we learned Jens kidneys went into failure because she was dangerously sepsis and this was causing her blood pressure to be extremely low. They told us they would hold her until a room was available and/or more likely discharged and to go home and rest and they would call. By now it was around 2 am. We had many angels surrounding us through this night, Earlier that day I had turned the volume on my phone off and for that Jen is extremely grateful I missed the scariest experience in her life. As explained by Jen: “ I woke up to doctors and nurses in the room telling me an ambulance is on its way and they were taking me to the icu. they had a hard time stabalizing me to transport me, once i was stabilized I was transfered to the icu in record time.”

The next day my voice mail said the room Jen was transferred to, me and Grace found out when we got to the hospital Jen was in the icu. It was extremely scary as we were expecting to be taking her home. By late afternoon Jen was stable enough she was moved out of the icu and to the cardio/pulmonary floor.

The Drs said Jen had developed uti (she had never had one before) and that it was most likely caused by the new vaginal fistula that was discovered a few months ago. Jen has already had multiple surgeries and procedures done in the last 2 years, at Sanford and the Mayo Clinic in Sioux Falls. We were told from the start by our amazing team of drs at Mayo that Jen would always need to be careful of diseases/infections etc to avoid becoming fully septic and that antibiotics are a life saving measure for her. We still do not know how Jen got so sick and why so fast. We are happy to report at this time she has no major organ failure, Jens kidneys are better, She is starting to have less spells with her blood pressure and fainting, etc.

Jen has an upcoming visit to Mayo in Rochester, Mn in August to determine what steps need to be taken for the new vaginal fistula and to ensure the perianal fistula is fixed.

We are not a family that easily asks for help. Jen is slowing down until her symptoms are better and she is seen at Mayo. We have quietly exhausted all financial options, we have used our entire savings, have depleted our 401ks. borrowed money from family, used 211 and now that we have exhausted all options, we are swallowing our pride and asking for help. All of our bills are behind due to Jen’s medical, we are at risk of losing our home, each time we go to mayo in rochester it costs us about $3-$5 thousand, plus hotels, travel expenses, food. 

We have been blessed with family that has taken unpaid time off to help with our kids and also family and friends that have been taking them to parks, birthday parties etc.

We cannot afford simple things for our children. We need help with bills, medical bills, food and help providing time out of the home for our kids. We are missing so many important life changes with the kids and they are our everything, which is why we are asking for help and swallowing our pride.

Our outstanding medical

bills are well over 20k. With Jens health going up and down so fast I had to leave my job and become a caregiver, when I am able to I do door dash to help with expenses. We would like to take this time to thank all of our family and friends that have helped us and all of our amazing medical teams.