Support Barbara's Care at Her Beloved Assisted Living

Please help Barbara Hahn Harvey, retired schoolteacher, live out her final years in the place she calls home. She is 77 years old, a former resident of Ninety Six, SC, and retired from Greenwood School District 52. She has been widowed twice and endured the loss of her young daughter, as well as her parents and her brothers. She is the mother of two surviving children, the grandmother of six, and the great-grandmother of four. She is suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, Dementia, Macular Degeneration, AFib, and a list of other ailments. She is also a breast cancer survivor.

I am her daughter, and when her second husband passed in 2020, I became her caregiver. Over the years, her health has deteriorated drastically, and we made the difficult decision to move her to Assisted Living after it became apparent she could no longer live in her home. We couldn’t afford the fees, but we were hopeful the VA would assist us, so we took all of our funds to make this happen for her while we waited on the application to go through. Unfortunately, they have since denied her claim.

She flourished at the Assisted Living Facility (ALF) and discovered wonderful friendships, but the falls never stopped. At the end of August, she fell, broke her ribs, and had to be hospitalized. After two hospitalizations and a chest tube, she was finally released to a local rehab facility where she still remains. However, her ability to be self-sufficient has diminished significantly, and she will require more assistance at the Assisted Living facility when she returns. This means that her care fees will increase, and we just can’t afford it.

I have borrowed money and sold any personal items that I could to help pay for Mom’s ALF. My husband is now facing his own health challenges, and I can’t continue to go down this path. My brother and his family have also been contributing, but we are all stretched beyond our abilities. Mom can’t live alone; our home isn’t AD accessible, and her pension from being a schoolteacher puts her barely over the Medicaid income limit. Her ALF doesn’t accept Medicaid anyway, and she doesn’t want to leave her new family. She is extremely attached to the staff and residents there. Every day when I visit her at the rehab facility (which is a Skilled Nursing Facility), she asks when she can go home. I do not like to ask for help, but I will for my Mom. Please help her return to her safe space while she can still recognize and enjoy it. She just wants to play Bingo with her friends!