My mother really could use your help.

My name is Aaron, and my mother, Teresa Buchanan, just lost everything but her life and her dog, Frodo.

The week before Christmas my brother Lucas and I were making plans to visit our mom for the holidays. We had boxes of gifts, among them an air fryer, an ugly carafe we knew she’d love, a fuzzy chenille throw blanket and matching socks. She had been having electrical issues for a few days, power cutting out in weird places, so we called an electrician and had him come out to check the box. He couldn’t determine what was happening but left us with a sense everything was at least safe, we would be there in a couple of days and could figure it out then.

December 23rd, while we were loading up our car to visit, a neighbor of our moms called to let us know there was a fire truck outside of the house. We desperately tried calling our mom to no avail. We knew. All we could do now was try not to panic, and do everything we could to reach her, get to her.

After what seemed like far too long, we were finally able to get in touch with someone near her. Yes, fire. She escaped. She was safe. The dog, Frodo, was safe. She grabbed the dog, an armful of Christmas presents, and ran down the street to a neighbors to call 911. The box that the electrician had just checked had ignited, leading to a fire that consumed our moms home. The fire began and burned so fast that she never had a chance to fight it.

The major losses started with our father Mark’s burial flag, and eventually consumed nearly everything. Photos, journals, heirlooms and antiques. All of mom's personal belongings, so many books… dad’s books. Everything she had left of our father. Clothes, bedding, and the kitchen where we shared meals, gone. Few things are salvageable. The house is unrecognizable, a complete loss. For her this house and everything in it were her life, everything she had.

2022 was already a year of extreme challenges for our mom.

In January she was admitted to the hospital, where she was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension, congestive heart failure and several other ailments. She was put on permanent oxygen and a port was installed in her arm to administer her medication. Over the course of one year, she spent about three solid months in a hospital bed, for everything ranging from bad drug interactions to blood infections. She lost her ability to work. She has only been surviving on our deceased fathers SSI income.

As difficult as all of that was, she’s a stubborn fighter. Despite odds and challenges, she was making progress. She made all the right lifestyle changes. She communicated openly what was going on. She followed the doctor's advice. She was feeling better, stronger. She still has a ways to go and health challenges ahead, but she has been taking care of herself, finally after all of these years putting herself first. Her spirit and determination is impressing us all.

With her health problems getting insurance that would cover her in this situation was a huge challenge. We had to figure out her estate, what she could afford, what she could give up. We worked with friends and lawyers, and figured out a gameplan for her future.

We hadn’t noticed that sometime during this battle the home insurance lapsed.

Currently she is staying on a friend's couch, but she has no place of her own. The plan now is to rebuild, keeping the home small but comfortable, to code and safe. We have a huge task ahead. This process will not be cheap, quick, or easy, which is why we’re asking for help. This is so recent that we’re still in the process of figuring out what all of this will entail.

Right now we’re trying to salvage and clean up what we can. There isn’t much, but we'll share updates on anything worthwhile we find. From here, we would like to purchase a weatherproof shipping container to keep on the property for the duration of teardown and rebuild, as this would be more affordable in the longer term than a storage unit. Cost after taxes and shipped runs $3300 for the most secure option.

Once any salvageable items are retrieved and storage solved, we can move onto tearing down the remainder of the existing structure and cleaning the land to prepare for rebuilding. The low bid from a local excavation company came to $22,000. This includes permitting, teardown, haul off, and bringing the land to rough grade.

From online research estimates for further costs may average:

Foundation $26,000 (We hope we may be able to salvage the existing foundation.)

Framing $41,000

Exterior $33,000

Interior: $60,000

These estimates run higher than we’re expecting to need in the end, but we’re resourceful and resilient. We’ll utilize local resources, Habitat ReStore, help of friends and our local connections, anything at our disposal to help keep costs down. We’ll update with milestones, photos, successes and continued health updates as we rebuild.

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