Life Comes At You Fast

A friend in need...

Just this morning I was scrolling Facebook and I saw a friend in need, so I’m sharing their story here…

When I was a kid I had a group of friends I was very close with - Andrew and Dan Lethcoe (twins), and Joe Otterby. We hung out, played video games, and told stupid jokes as often as possible. We were best friends growing up.

As often happens, we went off to college, got jobs, got married, and we don’t hang out so much anymore. I still consider them as brothers from different mothers.

A lot has happened since we were kids. All of us have our share of tragedy, triumph, and everything in between. Life is rough and you don’t often see the next thing coming around the corner. Sometimes, I wish we could all just go back to being kids, playing video games, and telling stupid jokes as often as possible.

Last 4th of July I was surprised when I ran into my good friend Andrew again. We were at a fireworks display in the small town we live near. He had just moved in. What a small and strange world.

He told me about how his job is going (he’s a Software Engineer too!), and how his daughter had a crazy health scare and liver transplant. I had no idea, but I’m glad she made it through.

And then recently his wife Jamie started posting on Facebook about being diagnosed with breast cancer and having to get chemo and radiation and all of that. It’s just completely heartbreaking that their family is dealing with the mom getting cancer after the daughter had a liver transplant.

I believe God is good, but sometimes this life is just too much to bear.

Which brings us to this morning. Jamie posted her GoFundMe page to help cover the medical bills that keep piling up. Here is what she wrote:

Hi, I'm Jamie and I'm raising money for our ENTIRE family of 5. We are in a major financial crisis selling everything we can, even a car. I was diagnosed with breast cancer that spread to my lymph nodes. After chemo, I'm getting a double mastectomy, with reconstruction and my ovaries have to come out too. Then I do radiation. Our poor 12 year old daughter Harper almost died a year ago after going into acute liver failure over a matter of 4 days. She got an emergency transplant. My cancer is a walk in the park compared to what we have to face every day with our precious daughter. I don't think there's been a "normal" day since her transplant. She now struggles with panic attacks, generalized anxiety and a few other mental health issues we are tackling with her great therapist. Harper has discs currently sent to Mayo and Children's Hospital in Omaha for physical problems from the trasnplant. We are waiting until we have enough money to sell our house and downsize. I didn't know how to enter the category since it's for me & my daughter. My last mammogram was 11 months ago and showed nothing. Now I have "invasive breast cancer" that spread to my lymph nodes in armpit. We have thousands in medical bills from years ago and they will be coming for years to come. Good thing, medical facilities usually do payment plans! Our immediate needs are for car payments until we can sell one and housing payments until we have enough to sell and downsize. f you read all this, bless your heart!!!!! If you're able to give or even pray for us BLESS YOUR HEART!!!! Sincerely, Jamie & Fam

If you have the ability to help out and bless them financially, please help. If you are a believer and want to pray for them or add them to a prayer list, I’m sure they would appreciate it. If you can’t do any of that, he’s got a great Youtube channel about code, so you could support him there too.

At this point, anything and everything helps.

I know that posting about stuff like this is hard. We all have our pride about money, work, and keeping everything personal and private. But in the face of tragedy, all that pride loses meaning and you just want to be okay again.

Help make life a little more okay for my friend and his family in their hour of need.

-Brian