Help Sammi Jo kick ALS ass

My baby sister, Sammi Jo, prior to September 2017 was a happy healthy 24 year old women. A fiancé to her high school sweetheart of 10 years and mother of 2 beautiful little boys, Cooper 4 and Owen 1. She loved living in their country home with room to raise her babies outside playing and enjoying the fields, the farms and tractor rides with the boys. She loved her family, loved life and was hopeful to keep growing her family.  She loved doing her makeup, getting ready, going to concerts because she loves music more than anyone I know.



Today my sister is diagnosed with ALS.

Here’s a brief description of the disease if you aren’t familiar. ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Motor neurons reach from the brain to the spinal cord and from the spinal cord to the muscles throughout the body. The progressive degeneration of the motor neurons in ALS eventually leads to their demise. When the motor neurons die, the ability of the brain to initiate and control muscle movement is lost. With voluntary muscle action progressively affected, people may lose the ability to speak, eat, move and breathe. 




Now her life looks very different. After a long year battle of doctors and tests and hospital stays trying to find out why she was losing the use of her arms, she now has lost the use of both arms entirely. She also has lost almost half of her diaphragms use, she no longer can lay down to rest or sleep because she can’t breath. In the last 6 months she has lost another 17% of her breathing. The things she once loved doing aren’t always an option these days with her disabilities from this horrible disease.



She has had to move to another town, to an apartment where she can be close to our mom who is her full time caregiver. Her life is completely changed. She needs care for everything from showering, getting dressed and eating. Finding herself unable to care for herself and her children is devastating! She struggled daily with the affects of her terminal disease and trying to learn to live with her body continually betraying her.



As things continue to progress she will be faced with further disabilities and needing help to carry on in her day to day life. On top of very large medical bills she has no way to pay and will continue to receive,  she will need things such as an adjustable bed.. that will allow her to adjust head and foot so she can get up herself, she also doesn’t want to lose the ability to sleep next to her fiancé while needing it,  special tools around the house to help her be as independent as possible, and many things that insurance doesn’t cover for her, she will also need a handicapped van to help her travel to her appointments at the ALS clinic in Milwaukee every 3 months and Mayo Clinic in Minnesota as well as being able to get out of the house and continue to live as normal of a life with her kids as possible. 



I am also hoping to help her take a vacation to see the ocean for the first time while she is still able to enjoy it. She has gone through hell the last year and a half and being faced with her disease rapidly progressing I want her to make the absolute most of every second she has left with us here. 


No one should be faced with their own death at 25 years old. No one should have to explain to their babies that they are dying. This disease is a monster and we need your help to help my sister fight it for as long as she can!



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Thank you so much for your help, thoughts, prayers and donations! We cannot express how much they all mean.