Hello there, my name is Mandolynne (Mandi) Cardwell. I am 32 years old. I live in Minneapolis Minnesota. I am a single mom to 11 year old twin girls, and I work full time at a hospital here in Minneapolis. I have lived in Minneapolis for almost 6 years.

You may be curious as to why I am on here, on GoFundMe. I am on here because I am in need of financial help. I am in need of major dental intervention/surgery. I have been informed that I need to have all of my upper and lower teeth surgically removed. Once my teeth have been removed/extracted, they will be replaced with a semi permeant dental implant on the upper section, and a denture on the bottom. Its a tough pill to swallow, to know you will need to lose all your natural teeth, but it is considered medically necessary for this procedure.

Where to Begin:

In 2018 I had weight loss surgery. Before that, I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. It was a shock to the system, but I knew I wanted to work on managing my type 2 diabetes. Being a single mom, I want to be a active parent in my daughters lives, I don't want to merely be on the sidelines. After starting on some medication and working with a nutritionist. The option of weight loss surgery was presented to me. The idea behind having the surgery was to use it as a tool to help feel full again. I had the surgery in October 2018 I was able to lose weight and restructure my eating habits. One of the things you are told about weight loss surgery is it can/will affect the nutrients going into your body and how your body processes those nutrients. And if you don't receive enough nutrients and allow them to work in your body, it can affect many parts of your body. One of those areas is your teeth. I started taking some vitamins and thought I would be okay. One of my main weakness/struggles when it came to food was pop/soda. Mainly Sprite. It has been so very difficult to give it up. I don't think there is one good thing about pop/soda nutritionally but it brought comfort to me. Smoking, drinking, it never interested me. I never thought to try either, especially as a stress reliever. But I found out that I was using drinking sprite as a stress reliever. Well as most know not only is pop/soda bad for you when your diabetic, its horrible on your teeth.

In December of 2019 I had to have my first root canal in regards to no enamel left on this weaken tooth. After getting the root canal, my dentist informed me, he saw several teeth that were going to need to be assessed, and most likely pulled. I decided to wait until 2020 to have the rest of my teeth looked at. I had already reached my max allotment on my dental insurance, so I wanted to wait until 2020 to have a new dental year. And I also wanted to get through Christmas. Then in late February 2020/March 2020 Everything shut down due to COVID. Schools closed, and lots of places of employments closed. Doctors and Dentist offices closed. For the first time in my lifetime, the world seemed to slow down.

During COVID, I was incredibly blessed to keep my job. But like most who kept working during COVID the stress was incredibly high. So much uncertainty. And I must admit the work of not drinking pop/soda, not eating out as much, taking vitamins, exercising. It all went out the window for several months. I felt there for awhile I was in survival mode. Making sure my daughters were getting logged into online school (I mean making sure they go to the babysitter on time to log in to online school) and making sure they had food and snacks. If it was not for my friends/family, I don't know what I would had done.

Around November 2020 my body started to tell me I needed to get back to taking care of it or else. I started to get what I thought were bad sinus infections and was in a lot of facial and sinus pain. I eventually found out that I didn't not have a sinus infection, I had 2 really bad tooth infections. One of the tooth's was abscessed. The tooth was not able to be saved, so I had to have a tooth pulled right around Thanksgiving. I again got another really bad tooth infection from having a broken wisdom tooth and broken tooth next to the wisdom tooth. I had to have those teeth pulled as well in December 2020. My teeth are breaking because none of my teeth have anymore enamel on them, others have deep cavities. They can't protect themselves. The dentist said between my family history, hard water deposits from growing up drinking hard water, being nutrient deficient, and having diabetes my teeth are no good. They have suffered.

I can't help but look back on my life and wish I had done something more, been more proactive and less fearful of the dentist. I brush my teeth, but could definitely be better at flossing. The idea of having to have a dental implant and a denture is if I am being honest with myself, its embarrassing. There are quite a few people in my family who have lost their teeth. Growing up I never wanted to be one of them. I am mad at myself. But I also know that at least I have options. I have gone so many years not fully smiling, not being able to chew on the left side of my mouth. There are already signs of facial structural changes in the jaw line from missing teeth that have been pulled.

I have been in a lot of pain in my mouth due to my teeth. I have been getting a lot of tooth infections and been put on antibiotics that make me feel sick a lot. I am losing sleep from being in pain and being woken up due to pain.

I finally went back to my dentist and they did a full exam and did all the required x-rays to give me a official treatment plan (2021). The treatment plan is as follows: I am to have all my teeth extracted. He (My Dentist) believe most will be simple extractions, but there will be a handful that will need to be surgically extracted. Before the teeth are extracted I will have molds made. The plan is to have a upper semi permanent dental implant put in on the top, and the bottom will be a denture. He wants to see how my lower section heals and if I end up having enough bone to put in a lower dental implant on the bottom, so for now the bottom will be a denture. When I was at the dentists office I was given 2 costs. The first being for the denture and implant. I will be responsible for about $1200-$1500 for those after insurance pays the other portion. I currently have a HSA and I have enough to cover the implant and denture through my HSA. The extractions which is the second cost is what will cost me the most. For extracting all the teeth, and with some being simple extractions and others being surgical, that cost is going to be roughly $9300. I unfortunately do not have enough money to cover the extractions.

I am asking for financial help on paying for the tooth extractions. I am unable to pay for them myself. My dentist office gave me brochures for medical credit/loans through a 3rd party company. However I do not qualify for those, and right now I do not think I could afford a extra bill like that. I am going to try and save some money to help go towards it, but I must admit I am on a single income and there is not much extra money after bills, groceries, gas, etc. I don't qualify for traditional assistance through the state, I have checked. The dentist office that I go to does not offer any extend payment plans for services. I would prefer to keep the dentist I have, for a few reasons. They work really hard to keep you comfortable and less anxious. They have different ways to help with the pain of the services they provide. Also, I have been fortunate to have a dentist I feel comfortable with, and I have been working with the same dental hygienist who helps keep me calm and less scared about the pain. To me this is a big dental procedure and I am scared and nervous. I want to be able to trust the people who will be doing the procedure and feel like they care. Its important that I get this procedure done sooner than later. With the teeth breaking off pretty consistently now and causing to gums to get infected as well as the area of the broken tooth, there is a concern that a infection may get into the bloodstream. It would also be really nice to not be in constant pain as well.

I have been working with my (medical) doctor on managing my type 2 diabetes. I am on a medication for my diabetes, and I am checking my blood sugars. Giving up pop has been the hardest. I have significantly lowered the amount of pop I drink, which for me is huge. I have lessened the amount of pop that I drink, and I also don't crave it as much as I had in the past. I am working with a nutritionist who is helping me with giving up pop as well (giving ideas for substitutes to pop/holding me accountable by checking in on me) . I truly believe I can and I will give it up.

I apologize for the long post here. I also apologize if it seems somewhat choppy of a story. I was trying to hit the main points on what is going on and why I need help. I sincerely appreciate you all for taking the time to read my post. If it is at all possible, and you feel you could donate towards my dental procedure, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, and please do so on my GoFundMe Page. And if you are unable to, I completely understand, we all have so much going on. Thank You again for taking the time out to read my post.

If you have any further questions about the dental procedure (who my dentist is, treatment plan) or about who I am, please feel free to get ahold of me on Facebook or ask for my email. I will respond in a timely manner.

Thank You So Very Much!!!

Mandolynne (Mandi) Cardwell