Taking care of Final Expenses for Gail Ann Okash

Hi,

A LITTLE BIT OF INFO ABOUT THIS FUNDRAISER: to maintain transparency, I need to remind everyone that; while the initial part of this Gofundme fundraiser was to ensure the cremation gets paid for on time, there are related expenses to this, as well. There is the memorial, and the chapel fee to have the memorial in/at, and I'm learning all of this as I encounter each fee. That's because I did not get a packaged cremation deal. I didn't expect any help to come through at all, so I got the least expensive price by ordering a la carte. Those package deals come with staff and location for the memorial, in a chapel big enough to house a large group and an appropriate setting for the occasion. So, all of our close, warm, & personal friends who have been waiting until that goal has been almost reached ... we've still got a little ways to go.

PLEASE DONATE ANYTHING YOU CAN heaven knows her son's not going to help.

THANK YOU ALL FOR THE LOVE BEING SHOWN FOR Ms. Gail Ann Okash

My name is John David Burks. Gail Ann Okash and I have been together for, right at 13 years. I love her and asked if she would marry me, I did that within the first two months of dating. She said she would, of course, things would need to be proper in our lives. Like finances, living arrangements, etc.

the first place we were in, was a converted garage studio apt. After 2 1/2 years there, we moved to a room in a friend's house. It was two blocks away from the first place.

I always liked it when Gail would tell me stories about her life experiences. She came to Escondido Ca, in the summer of 1979. Gail was a widow, with an 8-year-old son. The boyfriend, who moved her to California, became more and more physically abusive to her. She told me about, how one day she was standing at the kitchen sink washing dishes; her boyfriend was angry and arguing with her. The argument became so intense that this guy about 6 feet tall, standing behind his 5 feet 2 inches tall girlfriend, swung around landing a kick on the back of her neck. While it did do permanent damage to the vertebrae in her neck, she only went to the bed to lie down for a bit.

This guy and a few other boyfriends through the years were physically abusive to her as well.

Being a single mother in the early 1980s was challenging enough without abusive men.

Still, she was able to find work and provide for herself and her son. She told me stories of working with a roofing company for some time, where she got up on the roof to do the tear-offs just like the guys.

And she worked in the office of a muscle car shop and at a Title company too.

Gail also used her talents for sewing, when she worked at the Bean Bag Outlet in San Marcos. And in 1998, I happened to buy a bean bag to sit in front of my TV and play video games. And later, in 2020, wile quarantined at home , she took to her sewing machine, sent me to the fabric store with a list. She made a whole bunch of those face masks for protection against COVID 19. She sent me to give them to friends, with enough for them to distribute to their other friends

Fast forward . In January 2018, I had a heart attack, which left me disabled and unable to do many of the tasks I'd always done for work. The SSI denials of my claim for disability took 3 years of appealing, well, 37 months. Yet, their expert even agreed I couldnt work at the jobs I am qualified to do. In March of 2022, the SSI Appeals Judge decided I was disabled according to their definition.

The 3 years of stressing out over not having any dependable or steady income, took a toll on us both. The cancer that Gail was diagnosed with in 2015, in it's stage one, had progressed into stage 3 in 2021.

In a few months later, her doctor at the Genesis clinic here in Escondido, told Gail her cancer had progressed to stage 4 and he couldn't use the Cyberknife to treat it anymore, because it had metastesized into her lymph nodes. Gail had anxiety already, but at this point it had been heightened by stress from our financial problems, the cancer began advancing faster than before, and her 52 year old son's way of bullying her over the years both verbally and, before I was around her, with physical threatening behaviors stemming from an alcohol problem. Although, Gail had her own vices, who doesn't? But the only vice she let control her was nicotine. She'd been smoking since she was almost fifteen. As long as I have been alive.

As you can see in the picture of her with her granddaughter, she is beaming with love for that child. I had never seen that photo until the girl's mother sent it in an email to Gail.

With the result of being left without any income for so long, another thing intensifying Gail's anxiety levels was the fear of being evicted from the apartment we have been in for 3 1/2 years.

There are people young by far than Gail who have rental assistance and pay less for a 2 bedroom house than we pay for a small one bedroom apartment. How is a couple whose combined income is less than $2,000 expected to pay $1,440 plus Electric and other monthly expenses, fuel toilettries, laundry, insurance, etc It didn't help either that once the oncologist decided on the treatment , that insurance denied it for 2 more months.

All of these things is what left Gail without a chance against cancer or any other disease a person needs every bit of mind, body, and soul to fight with.

It feels like I'm rambling at this point, but it has been hard to watch the woman who overcame many obstacles and took the physical and emotional pain of the events in her life; was now slowly dying. I sat there with Gail in the next chair while she had the I.V. in her left arm during the hours she was receiving the first immunotherapy infusion, on January 30th of this year.

From ten minutes before we left home for the appointment, she sent a text to her son, saying she loved him and to give a little motherly advice ,because she knew she might not be here for him much longer. He only began furiously texting her with the most hateful things a mother could read from her son. And it wwent on for more than eight hours straight. I tried to get her to stop reading them but she couldn't, it was the most he had said to her in years.

All I could do is watch as the depresion took hold of her and she saddened even more with each word she read. The process was actually visible. But Gail didn't get outwardly angry over it. She was hurt. deeply hurt. All she could do was put her favorite light-hearted comedy on and take a nap in front of the TV.

Yes. All I could do is watch, as the woman I fell in love with 13 years ago, was slowly being killed by a disease inside her and a broken heart her son gave her, because the words "I love you mom" don't have much meaning after reading 8 hours worth of derogatory & hateful texts. It was literally visible, watching her go deeper into that depth. of depression. Knowing her cancer had become stronger as she was becoming weaker.

We had met and fell in love with one another, we had lived hand to mouth and on the streets together, times had been tough on her, but she had an inner strength that made her stronger and she came out of the tough times still loving God and praying to Jesus, with the ability in tact to laugh, and her incredible smile. She truly cared about people. Something we should all have in us. There are moments think about the positive side of Gail's personality, but at the end what echoes thru my head was hearing the fear in her voice as she cried out with so much urgency, "help me,help me,help me!" over and over and again. That's how the disease takes other people around out too. By robbing them of their loved ones.

Ok, instead of spending an entire evening writing things and dripping tears all over the keyboard. I need to get busy trying to get the funds together; not only pay for these final expenses , but now that half of the income is not gonna be there anymore, Ive got to figure out what to do, about any of it,really.

So g'nite everyone.