I’m writing to ask for help on behalf of my friends Sandra McMinn and Dave Bailey. Sandy is fighting a Blood Cancer called Myelofibrosis and finally, after years of pain and sub-standard treatment, she is getting treatment down here at Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC. Sandy and Dave live in Hamden, NY and grew up in Walton. Dave runs a small auto repair shop called “Hamden Auto Services” on Route 10 between Delhi and Walton. If you’re from the area you’ve passed it many a time.

Over the last six year Sandy and Dave have had to take multiple trips for life-saving treatments here in New York City. While these treatments, and her upcoming bone marrow transplant have given her a second chance, it is costing them all the money they have (and plenty that they don’t) to make this happen.

Sandy’s bone-marrow transplant this month will leave her vulnerable and unable to work for up to a year. It starts with a week of intense chemotherapy to wipe out her immune system and the transplant. She will have to stay in the hospital for 6 weeks here in NYC, then…somehow…she has to stay within 30 miles of the Hospital for another 100 days (over 3 months)! She also needs to have a person with her 24/7 that whole time. They need nothing short of a miracle to get through this!

Sandy and Dave are some of the most generous and kind people I have known. Always there to increase the peace and to help out friends and family. They are also a pair of intensely proud people who never ask for help. But at this point, when I asked Sandy if she would consider letting me start a crowd-funding page for them, she wrote “I'm trying to come to terms with needing help from friends, family, and the community…Times are tough for everyone these days and I just hate to ask or feel needy I guess. But, we don't have the means to do it ourselves.”

If you’ve had a friend or loved one with a painful and life-threatening medical condition (and if, like most of us, you are not terribly wealthy) then you know what kind of year Sandy and Dave have in front of them. Months of work loss for both of them and constant 300 mile round trips from Hamden/Delhi to NYC. Food needs to be eaten, travel costs such as gas, train, bus, taxis and parking will be needed and lodging paid. Sandy’s dog, Bella and their cat Sparks needs love and care, and…oh yeah, the medical costs. This is a leap of faith. All Sandy wants is to live and feel healthy and productive again, and you can imagine that Dave wants all that for her and more. They are doing it. They have to. We all would. But they have no idea how they can afford this. Dave has pretty much had to close his business so they could deal with all of this. And in the immediate future, Sandy is probably the only thing that Dave can truly focus on getting fixed-up and restored.

Please help these two people survive during this storm they are about to weather together.

I am asking you to help me reach my goal of raising $4,000 to help with temporary housing, dog boarding, food while in NYC, travel expenses and weeks-to-months of work loss for both of them. There are no presents or mugs or T-shirts for us when we donate. All I can promise is that as their fundraising cheerleader, I will update all who donate, and share their journey with those who have helped them along the way.

We all need some help sometimes. Together, let’s help Dave and Sandy make the impossible possible.

With love,

Hank Coyote Wagner