Hey there everyone.
First just let me say thank you for reading my request. I’m a proud woman and asking for help is very hard for me, even if it’s for someone else. You’ll understand if you read through. I’m a 65 year old retired floral designer and I’m almost totally disabled. I had to quit working for good in 2005. I’ve a list of ailments as long as your arm of health issues which have me bedridden 90% of the time. (I won’t bore you with the list.) I only leave the house once a month to go to my pain doctor and now and then to other doctors as well as a hospital visit occasionally. My mobility is very bad now and my primary Doc has wanted me to get a wheelchair for a couple of years now but I’ve been procrastinating. (I wouldn’t be able to use it in the house anyway unless every doorway was widened.) I use a walker away from home and do OK at home with my cane most days.
My husband is a 73 year old man with severe COPD and a spine full of arthritis. He’s a retired Marine with 25 years of service. From Vietnam to Desert Storm, he was there. He’s been to 80 countries! After the Corps he became a policeman for a few years then changed to the Sheriff’s Department. We met in 2000 while he was there. He was a cop for 12 years and retired again. He worked in Animal Control for 7 years as well. His mobility problems aren’t quite as bad as mine but he’s catching up to me fast. Plus on top of that, he can’t breathe.
With all our health problems we’ve needed quite a bit of help over time. We have a wonderful friend who used to be our neighbor. We met her through her 3 sons who were all our yard workers over their high school years. Each one as they went through the grades. Barbara, their mom started working for us cleaning the house a couple of times a month and doing extra chores and running errands sometimes. She’s honest, hard working, and dependable. She’s also a great friend. She’s partially disabled herself but manages around here ok. She’s also worked for other elderly people who needed personal care but lately her employers have been passing away. We’re all she has right now.
Four months ago Barbara’s boyfriend totaled her car driving to his first day at a new job. (He lost the job before he ever got there.) Barbara and he are quits and they lost their place since neither could afford the rent alone. He moved into an old, broken down van at his brother’s and Barbara came to us. She’s been offered several new old folks to care for but hasn’t been able to take the jobs because she doesn’t have a way to get there. We have only one vehicle ourselves and it’s 22 years old so it’s starting to dollar us to death. The hubby doesn’t want us without it in case we have an emergency. I’ve had several falls and each time I was hospitalized so he says we need it here. He’ll let her run to the store or the pharmacy for us because they’re less than 10 minutes away. She came to live with us 4 months ago and we’re giving her free room and board, I’m paying her phone bill (and have had to replace the thing when she’s broken it twice) and the hubby buys her cigarettes. She borrows money quite often but always pays it back or works it off.
Now finally I’ll get to the point. Having Barbara here to help us full time is wonderful because we both think the world of her and she’s doing dishes and laundry and other stuff we can’t easily do anymore but having an extra person in the house has done a number on our food bill, the power bill (it came today and was up over $80 from last month!), not to mention hubby’s always paying her for extra stuff he finds for her to do, like washing the vehicle or cleaning out the refrigerator. That sort of stuff. We can’t afford it. We’re getting overdrawn in both our banks for the past two months and it’s worse every time. Our savings are gone (there wasn’t that much anyway. The hubby loves to shop and the PX calls out to him…LOL)
If we could afford it we would loan Barbara enough money to buy a “new” used car but we simply don’t have it. We were living paycheck to paycheck before Barbara came and can’t afford to take out a loan. We’re already carrying a lot of debt. I took the cash value out of my life insurance two months ago to catch us up but it’s gone. We really need to get her some wheels so she can start taking more clients or get a job in town. If you folks could help out it would truly be a blessing. She’s a good person but has just fallen on a bad time financially and is dragging us down with her when all we wanted to do was help her out. We’d really appreciate anything you could spare. I know this is the worst time of year with the holidays coming up but you’ll be in all our prayers.
Thanks again! Cathy
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/Cathy6285
The hubby thinks she ought to be able to find a decent used car for about $10,000. Cars just cost so much nowadays that it sounds like a huge amount but it isn’t if you look at the price of used cars these days.