Help for Our Kathy

Up until a week ago our beautiful Kathy was a healthy, vital woman — your everyday 34-year-old, young mother. She was working physically hard juggling a new busy business with her husband, all while balancing her domestic life and raising her beloved one-year-old daughter, Zoe. 

On Thursday 15th November, Kathy attended her local hospital in Noosa after feeling progressively worse from a recent bout of sickness both her, her daughter and husband had come down with earlier. She was kept in at the hospital but no definitive diagnosis was given. 

On Sunday they did further tests and the results, which became available on the Monday, were able to tell that she had a virus attacking her heart: Viral Myocarditis.

On that Monday afternoon she was air-lifted to Prince Charles Hospital in Brisbane. She had immediate surgery to put a device on her heart that would keep it going. Kathy is now on life support and has already undergone 5 surgeries in less than 48 hours; the most risky one being open heart surgery to instead implant a device into her heart so her heart can keep working to give her the time to help build its strength and fight the virus.

Every minute is touch and go as the risks associated with life support are very real, such as clotting (which accounts for the other surgeries she has needed).  Our greatest hopes and prayers are that Kathy's heart builds its strength and can start to work all on its own so she doesn't need any machines and she is awake, smiling and with us. 

The reality is even if our greatest hopes are realised, Kathy will likely have months in hospital healing and potentially long-term health complications.

Her husband will now need to go back to Noosa to keep the business running and commute the 4 hour-return trip. Close family and friends have made their way to Brisbane from around Australia to help with the baby, support her husband and attend to the day-to-day needs and hospital visits.  

Both Kathy and her husband are originally from other countries (Ireland and Turkey) and have immediate family members who will need to fly to Australia, too. 

It's always hard to ask for help, but we know that right now any urgent donations would go such a long, long way in minimising the stresses associated with all the current on-going costs (such as accommodation, travel, bills, etc) and would help alleviate concerns about how they will manage moving forward in such critically uncertain times with no assets to pull on.

Kathy's current condition is very severe and rare, yet Viral Myocarditis is more common than people think; In fact, it accounts for 5-20% of
unexpected and sudden deaths in otherwise healthy young adults. It doesn't discriminate age, sex or health status. It truly is an illness that strikes from nowhere with such devastating consequences.

Not in a millions years would we have ever dared consider this would be the reality that Kathy and her family are facing.

It always feels like a cliché to say this, but Kathy is truly the most beautiful and generous of souls, and it breaks us to know her baby daughter can't be with her mother. 

Any donation amount for Kathy would be forever acknowledged in this time of need.

Donations will be used to:

- Support familial travel and accommodation so family members can be close to the hospital and Kathy to help.

- Running day-to-day costs in this extreme uncertain time: such as their rent, Zoe's childcare, utilities, etc., for her husband while he juggles between their fledging business, their 14-month-old daughter, and 4-hour return-travel to Kathy at the hospital.

- Kathy's diagnosis of Viral Myocarditis and the severity of her circumstances will mean she will have continued on-going treatment, a lengthy stay in hospital and health complications which means her ability to support her family (financially and care of her daughter) will be drastically limited, so we hope these donations can alleviate the anxiety of those concerns.

We thank you!

*This Gofundme has been created by Kathy's sister-in-law in conjunction with Kathy's family. All donations will be transferred to Kathy and her husband.