Celebrate Lindsay's 42nd Birthday Keep Her Alive!

In a month and a half I will be turning 42. This means that I will have been living, and rather thriving, with ALS for over eleven years! This is truly amazing and it would not be possible without all of you. I need your help getting a big birthday fundraiser going so that I can continue living and thriving!

ALS is so expensive to live with for a few reasons. I require a caregiver with me 24/7. I have a team of phenomenal caregivers and I like to pay them as well as I possibly can, which is over $3000/ week. I need to stay at home because that is where I received the best care, but I am also able to eat truly nutritious food, take the supplements that help keep me going (another expense), make the art that keeps my spirit happy, and to be with my most beloved cats who are my emotional and soul support.

Please help me raise $42,000 for my 42nd birthday! This year’s going to be epic including several collaborative art projects, a documentary film that is already in the works, more herbal medicine making, paintings, sparkles, and so much Lindsay goodness!

Lindsay Abromaitis-Smith is a 41 year old artist, herbalist, and pleasure activist living with ALS. She was diagnosed in 2012, and over ten years of this journey has yielded both unimaginable joys and hardships. Lindsay has full time care needs that go beyond what her mother, Karin is able to do. They have found an incredible team of caregivers and now they need your help to pay them a living wage.

Before her diagnosis, Lindsay was a professional puppeteer and bodyworker living and working in NYC. In 2015 she relocated to Flemington, NJ, where she and her mother Karin are both long-term artists in residence at the Takaezu Studio. While Lindsay and Karin both continue to make art, Karin has had to give up the bulk of her career as a director, teacher, potter, and jewelry designer in order to manage Lindsay’s full-time care needs. Lindsay has turned her creativity towards painting, using her feet to paint, and making delicious herbal remedies. Currently, Lindsay is working on a photo series with some friends and creating a series of online workshops in order to show the world that people who are differently abled can be beautiful, powerful, and multidimensional. She also creates rituals and custom tea ceremonies to honor and connect to the earth.

Living with ALS and managing the full-time care needs of an ALS patient are two of the most demanding experiences imaginable. Lindsay spends most of her life in bed, and relies on an eye-controlled computer to communicate with, and a cough-assist machine to keep her airways clear. She needs 24 hour a day care, and relies on human assistance to eat, get in and out of bed, use the restroom, shower, brush her hair and teeth, get dressed, scratch her nose, and pet her cats. Medicaid covers 70 hours a week of this care, but the other 98 hours a week are up to Lindsay and Karin to manage and pay for. Ensuring that they have quality care available to Lindsay at all times is the biggest ongoing expense and the most urgent need for their household. In 2015 Karin did the bulk of this “after hours” caregiving herself, unpaid; in October of that year she suffered a stress-induced heart attack and as a result is no longer able to fulfill this role herself.

For the past six years, Karin and Lindsay have relied on a combination of government subsidies, income from art sales, and donations from aid organizations and friends and family to cover the cost of Lindsay's care. Since Karin has put her career on hold to care for Lindsay, she has been drawing from her retirement account to cover costs when their expenses exceed their income, which is frequently. This is unsustainable; to be blunt, she simply does not have enough to finance the care that is needed.

In addition to the primary expense of Lindsay’s care, other monthly expenses include supplements and functional medicine such as acupuncture and massage, the cost of insuring and maintaining Lindsay’s wheelchair accessible van, phone and internet bills, and art supplies.

Any and all donations will go directly towards providing for Lindsay's care and are appreciated beyond what words can express.