Widowed Gracie (Sunshine) is Facing Eviction

I am calling on our friends to help our friend Gracie (Sunshine) Whitmore while she tries to get back on her feet after several crushing blows in recent months.

This request for help is meant to halt this current financial crisis so Gracie can focus on her regaining her health, saving her small studio condo home of nearly twenty years, helping her out-of-state mother on hospice care, and resolving a year-delayed VA benefit claim which would put her back on solid financial footing.

The most immediate concern:

Her mortgage will go into foreclosure if the bank doesn’t receive at least two payments by May 27th. Other monthly expenses have fallen behind as well.

Some of you met Gracie through groups related to music. Others of you met Gracie and her husband Scott through local aquarium club meetings. And some of you have been neighbors in the same building for many years. They were active socially before Scott’s passing, and always brightened any gathering they attended.

The goal is for Gracie to be able to work part-time from home again and receive her monthly surviving spouse benefits from the VA related to his service-connected illnesses and burial expense. She needs to buy enough time to handle these pressing matters without becoming homeless.

Resolving the VA claim would go a very long way towards improving her financial stability. She would, with careful budgeting on her reduced income, be able to continue living in her home.

What happened?

Just over a year ago Scott, a decorated Vietnam vet (LRRP, L Company 75th infantry, 101st Airborne Ranger), lost his battle with a very aggressive version of Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma caused by his exposure to Agent Orange. He had previously fought and beat prostate cancer from the same cause. Gracie was obliged to halt her part-time work to care for her husband Scott after he could no longer work due to his illness’s progression. Before Scott’s illness claimed his life, he required 24/7 care as the illness and its treatments left him incapacitated. She did her best to care for him before his passing, in spite of her own health challenges. A few months ago, it caught up with her.

On May 9, Gracie was admitted to Northside Hospital after a visiting friend found her confused and very sick. After emergency surgery for peritoneal abscesses and a long ICU stay, she spent three months in the hospital for sepsis, several resistant infections and their complications, healing large open wounds from the surgeries, and relearning how to walk and use her hands. When she was released home in August, she spent several more months in physical and occupational therapy trying to regain strength and mobility. She is still struggling with mobility issues, continuing related health issues, trauma, and extreme exhaustion.

As of now, Gracie is trying to manage the out of pocket expenses of her own illness, afford necessities and medicines, maintain her home, and all of the usual life expenses. In addition, she is caring remotely for her mother, who went on hospice care with only her own monthly disability payments.

She has run out of funds and out of time. With the local VA offices closed during the height of the pandemic, it took months of struggling to get the claim submitted. The VA offices have since re-opened, but the VA has lost some of the submitted claim information and are essentially starting from the beginning. This process was further delayed by Gracie’s difficult recovery from her recent illness.

Unfortunately, Scott’s life insurance paid less than expected due to a clause reducing it on his birthday shortly before his death. The same insurance company mishandled two critical illness claims from this same time period, so that they paid out less than a quarter of what was owed from his policies. They then refused to communicate the reasoning, or the appeal process, until after the time for appeals was past.

Ways you can help:

If you are physically able to assist, able to help with paperwork and appointments, or interested in helping with the selling of items, please reach out ASAP.