Support Kelly & Amanda After Their Loss

(Edit/Update added below 5/2/2025)

Friends, as many of you know, our mom and grandmother, Clara (Buswell) LaMarr passed away on March 16th with very little warning.

In addition to the severe mental and physical health toll that losing our third musketeer has taken on me and my daughter, it has also created a large financial burden.

Unfortunately my mom’s $10,000 life insurance policy turned out to be a Term 80 policy, which means it only paid out until she was 80. She needed to convert it to whole life to have it continue but this was not explained by the insurance company, and she had gleefully written on the policy documents “PAID IN FULL!!”. Although she faithfully paid her premiums for nearly 30 years, there will be no payout because she was 83 when she passed away. She has a smaller second policy but she had a loan against it from 2012, so we are still waiting to see what if anything will come of it. Any payout will be split between me and my brothers, and the total costs have fallen to me and Amanda.

In addition, my brothers have been unable to help with any of the clean out her apartment and property, leaving all the work to my young daughter and me. We both take public transportation and we do not own a vehicle, so every time we have to go north, we have had to rent a vehicle and pay for gas. We have made a lot of progress with her things, but there are too many large things left that we cannot handle alone. We need to rent a truck, pay for mileage and gas, and hire movers to help with the remaining furniture. We have already made several trips north to do this work and have to go one more time before the end of the month. We have to have everything done by Sunday, April 27.

To add to the stress, during the time she was in the hospital and in the weeks since, I have also had to take many unpaid days off to deal with everything, putting my job in jeopardy because I work in a new, part time, government position under probation for the first year. I also had to cover end of life expenses and several bills out-of-pocket in the absence of the life insurance. We decided not to do a memorial service because we can’t afford it. Honestly, I have not even published her obituary due to the cost right now because other things has to take priority…

My daughter has been a tremendous financial help, but she is starting a new job in 2 weeks, which also requires her to move to a new apartment where she will need to pay rent/deposit, etc. up front. (Her housing is part of her current job compensation, so she has no choice on moving, despite the bad timing.)

EDIT/UPDATE: To further complicate things, I am a government employee under probationary status for my first year of employment (I started the job November 2024). Probationary status means that during that time, they can let me go for any reason and don’t even have to provide a reason. Unfortunately that is just what recently happened— my job let me go.

I hate that we have to ask for help, but we are desperate at this point. So friends, I am asking. It would help us get across the finish line and it would allow me to pay my daughter back some of what she has pitched in so she is not in a bind moving forward with her own situation after this. And now with the loss of my job, it would help keep things afloat with rent and utilities while I hustle for a new job.

Anything you can afford would be so greatly appreciated.

Thanks for considering us.

Kelly & Amanda (and Clara too)