Medical Treatment and quality of life

I come to you today with a heartfelt plea for assistance on behalf of my mother, Janet, a truly special individual. She has been facing an uphill battle against a series of debilitating health issues. Her journey has been marked by tremendous resilience and strength, but she now finds herself in a position where she needs collective support more than ever. Her struggle is causing her an enormous amount of stress and financially, she is not able to pay both her bills and medical expenses necessary to help improve her quality of life.

In 2016, my mom underwent brain surgery for the coiling of a brain aneurysm. Something that runs heavily in my mom’s side of the family as we lost my aunt and niece to the same illness and my grandma is also a survivor of this. My mom’s recovery was complicated by some prolonged physical and cognitive changes following the procedure. Unfortunately, she did not receive the necessary ongoing long-term rehabilitation due to her insurance coverage at the time. My mom continues to suffer from several debilitating health conditions, which often fill her days with immense pain, mental and physical fatigue, decreased mobility/endurance, chronic vision difficulty which impairs reading and impaired cognitive function.

In April of 2023, after years of a progressive worsening of these ailments, Janet was assessed at the Mayo Clinic. The physicians informed her that her conditions are chronic and incurable. Neurorehabilitation/recovery of lost function is less likely to occur after this many years and her conditions will continue to progress. Therefore, her symptoms will be something she has to manage vs repair. The focus now is on improving her quality of life by providing supportive measures. The physicians at Mayo have said her brain is in constant fight or flight mode, which does not allow her brain to rest between tasks and activities. Her daily functioning is significantly limited in this regard, as this causes significant and prolonged bouts of fatigue and pain, which are unpredictable, making her days difficult to plan.

My mom’s medical team has recommended that she focus on improving her quality of life through various therapies, compensatory strategies, pain management, alternative therapies (massage, strengthening) and anything else she may find helpful. Currently, my mom receives in-home assistance with some daily tasks, such as cooking, cleaning, laundry and monitoring of her physical symptoms. She has limited professional help at home and would greatly benefit from increasing this, but must pay for this out of pocket. Her vision will not improve, so she will continue to require ongoing assistance with household maintenance. Because of her mobility and balance issues, she also needs help with improving safety around her home, such as installing handrails and a railing at her front entrance. Additionally, Janet has been commuting 192 miles round-trip from Western Wisconsin to the Mayo Clinics in Rochester, Minnesota in a car that needs significant repairs. More recently, she has been paying for this medical transportation.

I have witnessed my mom help by serving others in so many facets throughout her life, I really hope that she will be able to get the support now, when she needs it the most. We, as Janet's daughter, family and close friends, are requesting donations. All donations will be directly used for improving my mom's quality of life through recommended therapies, safety measures and to ensure she is able to commute to/from Rochester for treatments.

Thank you so much!