I last wrote in January about the troubles of long-time kossack
aitchdee -- you can
see that diary here.
Since that time, with the help of many people here, she's made significant progress, but she still needs some help. I won't repeat her whole backstory, since it's in the linked diary; there's plenty new to tell below the fold, mostly from aitchdee herself with a little editing from me.
- Condo: aitchdee did indeed file for bankruptcy, as so many here advised. This forced all her creditors, including the county tax assessor, to cease all collection activity. It did NOT, however, discharge her tax debt. It DID give her another year before the tax auction will take place (so, Feb. 20, 2016). Since she can't work and her only prospect for having any income is SSDI, she's not in a position to try and move until she has some way to pay rent.
- SSDI: All the documentation the SSA requires has been completed. Her own doctors have turned in their reports, and she's been seen by two SSDI-mandated doctors, and is now simply waiting for word, which is said to take 4-5 weeks. Some say she has a very good chance of being approved (apparently they "like" to see sero-positivity and arthritic deformity) so, fingers crossed.
- Rheumatoid Arthritis: The arthritis has gone into her knees, making it very difficult to stand up when seated, and very painful to walk. A course of prednisone helped her a great deal, but it cannot be used long-term, so the process is, take the prednisone, enjoy the improvement until it gradually wears off, and then struggle again until it's safe-ish to take another round. Methotrexate doesn't seem to help her at all. She has not yet been able to see a rheumatologist.
- Phone: She's been approved for a Lifeline cell phone, free, as is its plan -- thanks, Obama! It won't arrive for a few more weeks, so she's using prepaid cards until then.
- Food Stamps: She is not on food stamps yet. She's been thwarted in her efforts to apply online, because her monthly income is zero dollars and the online application cannot handle that. She needs to go to the Human Assistance Office in downtown Sacramento. That's a challenge for her because of the arthritis, and also because her car's been overheating and the registration is expired. She's been getting rides from a WONDERFUL local kossack, but that person has been out of town for some weeks. So this project is still in progress.
- Animal Friends: aitchdee is kept sane by her companions, a dog and a cat. Some will remember that a bit of money was raised last year for the stated purpose of putting the cat, Camoo, to sleep. Camoo is a 16-year-old cat with feline hyperthyroidism; it's a condition that can be easily treated when one has enough money to pay a vet, but aitchdee was looking at homelessness and feeling desperate. In the end, she got as far as the vet clinic's parking lot and couldn't do it. She used the money to buy cat food, which Camoo eats in copious amounts because of her condition. aitchdee's dog, Frances, is well, but is overdue for her vaccinations and also some grooming, as she's developing mats that cannot be dealt with with regular scissors.
So, this is mostly good news. The support and advice that aitchdee received from this community allowed her to avoid being put out on the street. (She was so terrified, and so relieved to not become homeless, that she literally broke out in hives.) There are two local kossacks who have been an endless blessing to her with transportation, advice, and other help. She thanks them and we do too -- this is Daily Kos at its absolute best.
She apologizes profusely for not having written earlier to thank and update the community. (I must say that, having dodged a few bullets myself in my time, the relieved introvert tends to curl up in a ball for a while after a thing like that.) She is ENORMOUSLY GRATEFUL for the help that she has received from all of you, and asked me to make that as clear as I possibly could.
At this point, her situation is just a waiting game, and we need, if we can, to help her win it. She has no income of any kind until she gets SSDI, but obviously, expenses continue to mount. She unavoidably consumes food and medications and personal products; the animals need food and health maintenance; her car needs its registration renewed, and it's out of gas (until recently, it was out of oil, too, which you can imagine was an issue); she needs to pay water and electric bills. Her expenses are minimal, but zero dollars don't go very far.
Can you help her make it through the weeks until she hopefully receives SSDI? Absolutely any amount is more than she has now. She's been without anything for so long, she's got a big backlog of what I might call "ignored infrastructure", but first up are her current bills. She must pay about $200 by April 30 to keep the lights and water on. These bills have already been extended as long as possible.
We have a $250 matching-funds offer from an anonymous kossack, so the first $250 given today gets doubled! Many thanks to that donor!!!
If you can spare any money without harming yourself, her first choice is PayPal because that gets her the funds quickly. Many thanks to JekyllnHyde for these instructions:
If you've never used PayPal to send money to anyone, it is really simple.
- Go to PayPal.com. You do not have to have an account to send money.
- Click Send Money to Family and Friends.
- Enter aitchdee's email address (which is twilithour@mac.com) and amount you are sending. The sender's name is visible to the recipient.
For those of us who can't deal with PayPal, she still has a GoFundMe page. They are slower to release funds to her, so please use this only if you cannot use PayPal.
GOFUNDME
And if you'd prefer, she's made a new Amazon wishlist with non-perishable foods and household items she needs (pet food at the top!) Please use this link, and not the one from the older diary. If you buy from the wishlist, they can ship to her directly. If you'd like to send essentials not through Amazon, please kosmail aitchdee for her shipping address, and let her know what you're sending so she can take it off her wishlist manually.
AMAZON WISHLIST
If you'd like to send money and cannot deal with any means of doing so other than sending a paper check by USPS,
1) Please consider instead buying and mailing an inexpensive postal money order. aitchdee could cash these at any post office without a fee. Thanks to Most Awesome Nana for this idea!
2) If it needs to be a check, please kosmail aitchdee for her information. We list this choice last because she no longer has a bank account, so cashing the check costs her a fee of 10% of the check value. Nonetheless, it's more money than she'd have had otherwise, so if you need to use this method, of course she is very happy to have your help.
As always, recs, tips, republishes, mention in open threads, FB shares, and tweets also help bring more eyes to the diary and thus more potential help. Many, many thanks.
Fri Apr 24, 2015 at 5:57 PM PT: We're up to $200 on PayPal! Closing in on that match!
Fri Apr 24, 2015 at 7:19 PM PT: With PayPal and checks, we have a match and have received the $250 matching funds!
We have a new match offer of $300, so your dollars will still be doubled. Let's keep it going!