Hi,
It seems there is nothing in health care for us. My husband worked since he was 14 and paid taxes ever since he could. I would love help to make our home handicap accessible! Optimally get grant for a handicap bedroom/bathroom built off the dining room. Then my husband and I could be in the same room again. It is hard for us to be sepaprated. We could also use a small saltwater pool for exercise since he cannot walk and it would help the skin condition the disease causes.
My husband Bob was in hospital from May 19th until October 23rd 2009. When he came home Social Security approved his disability 100%. I am now his full time caregiver and am looking for work from the home or caregiver grants/funds..
Bob has recently encountered more misfortune in less than a year than most of us would experience in a lifetime. First of all Bob’s health has not been picture perfect for eleven years while fighting the in-curable disease called Churg Strauss Syndrome
http://vasculitis.med.jhu.edu/typesof/churgstrauss.html (an auto immune vascular disease). He also has Prednisone hastened Diabetes. However, Bob was the master of disguise when it came to his job. Then when the economy took a nose dive, so did Bob’s job with Bosch Corporation/Vetronix for the last 14 years. Struggling but managing to make ends meet Bob had an accident. He got tangled up with a roll around seat/chair on Mothers Day of 2009 (May 10th). The accident left him with a baseball sized bruise on his left inside calf. He went to the doctor the next morning where he got a tetanus shot, antibiotics, the whole nine yards. Then about two weeks later he was hurting so bad he couldn't walk. He went to the emergency room on (May 19th) with a high fever and they lanced his wound, turns out to be an antibiotic resistant staff infection MRSA. He started having problems with his heart and was admitted to Intensive Care @ Shands Hospital in Lake City, FL then transferred to Gainesville. The first round in Gainesville lasted about three weeks. During that time his bowels became heavily impacted. When he finally had a bowel movement the strain was so great that he ruptured his colon, but it went unnoticed by the hospital staff but not us. No one listened. The hospital released him to go home but that only lasted 5 days before he developed another high fever of 103. The Shands Hospital in Lake City X-rayed him and saw he had a "life threatening situation" that required a helicopter emergency Life Flight to Shands Hospital in Gainesville. Eighteen inches of his colon was removed and he was fitted with a colostomy bag. Again the hospital sent him home prematurely against our will. This time lasting less than 24 hours before he had to be rushed back to Gainesville Hospital. The operation failed and had to be done over. From there he was transported to the rehab hospital, Select Specialty Hospital in Gainesville where he remained from July 21st to October 23rd . He had developed a MRSA blood infection again that is resistant to treatment with most antibiotics, MRSA, plus a bug resistant to the antibiotic vancomycin, VRE. The doctors were trying aggressive combinations of new "super antibiotics" to try to kill the bug. But the bug was not cooperating and they are running out of options. Lord willing, he survived this ordeal, but the odds against Bob are still high.
As his spouse, I have my hands more than full, 24/7 caregiver trying to hold the family and household together, working and traveling an hour back and forth from hospital to home for over 51/2 months took a toll. Our daughter has moved back home to help give support to the family. We are desperately trying to prevent filing bankruptcy however it looks imminent and his medical insurance is temporary (cobra) of which only covers a portion of his hospital expenses and costs near $1000.00 a month. Needlessly to say we desperately need help. Since Bob has been home October 23, 2009, he has endured five 911 ambulance rides to hospital, almost six, fallen four times and has been completely bedridden since the fall. One of the falls was backward in his wheelchair. He was trying to go up a ramp we made and it tipped him. Our children called 911 and he is still recovering from a bad concussion, fractured vertebre and a wound that required five sutchers.
We have brought in little income since Bob was severed through the corporate takeover. We have spent the vast majority, if not all by now, of Bob’s retirement. I had nothing being an at home mother and freelance artist/victim advocate, raising the family while Bob was on the road serving his customers in his huge territory of three states. This Bull of a man has lost all of the things that most of work all of our lives for and deem important. Together we will get through this knowing the cost of living, especially with the odds stacked against us. We are a couple that will never grow old together. Those dreams are gone, replaced with a driving need for me to command the kind of income it takes to support the decades of medical debt, children, a home, cars, insurance for them and for us... I could work 3 minimum wage jobs and accomplish that. Realistically I cannot. I am here taking care of my husband so we can maintain the quality of life that remains. Our home is NOT ADA compliant. We built makeshift ramps out of necessity. My husband went to navigate the outside ramp when he fell over backwards. We are medically bankrupt and need help bad. Everyone says there is stuff out here for us, though through exhaustive daily searches local and nationwide, we have not been able to get any help. Bob is 57.
Sincerely:
Rose E. Grier
