We had to write a letter of hardship to apply for this program that will pay for all the back payments we've missed and catch us up so our house loan can be re-instated.  I thought I'd share this with you guys in case someone else needs help in how to write one of these letters to keep their home.  We technichally lose our house tomorrow...obviously they won't just come kick us out BUT, ya know, that fact stinks after fighting SO hard to get back on top of things!  So here ya go...yes, I wrote it for my husband.  ;)  All personal details have been redacted.  I still can't believe this is our life...

To whom it may concern,

I was asked to write a letter explaining the life circumstances that have brought us to a point where we have financial difficulties; specifically, why we have struggled to keep up with our mortgage payments on our home at ________________.  The story that I share is truly our life and not a Greek tragedy.  My wife and I have been blessed with five precious children.  This is the story of the past two years in our family.

______________ 2014 my wife shared with me the happy news that we were expecting our 5th child!  Four days later our oldest son shared with us that he felt an abnormal lump on his body.  We made urgent doctor appointments due to the fact that he shared with us that it had grown in size.  After performing numerous tests the doctor decided that the lump needed to be removed because he believed it was cancer.  That surgery changed our son’s life forever because the tumor was attached to one of his testes and therefore they had to remove both the tumor and part of his manhood in surgery to prevent the possible spreading of cancer cells.  ____________2014 was the surgery and biopsy.  We nervously waited to find out the diagnosis and during that waiting period my pregnant wife ended up fainting due to back pain which in turn caused the E.R. doctor to suspend her licence to drive until they were sure she was not going to faint again behind the wheel.  Eleven, emotional, nail-biting days went by and on _____________ 2014 we were finally told a diagnosis for our oldest son: an aggressive form of cancer called embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma.  Treatment needed to start right away!

His treatment plan was very intense and would take a year to complete.  The chemotherapy drugs that were given to him demanded he be inpatient at the hospital to prevent damage to his bladder.  He underwent another surgery to dissect his lymph nodes first; the cancer had already spread.  April Fool’s Day, during his first Spring break of his ____________ year of high-school, our son was given the first dose of chemotherapy. Our son became very ill from the chemotherapy drugs!  He was so sick that sometimes they had to pause treatment so that his liver wouldn’t go into failure!  Now, remember, my wife couldn’t drive at this time so she ended up setting up a schedule for volunteers to drive her to and from weekly doctor appointments for both she and our son as well as cover getting our other three children to and from various babysitters, school classes, special therapy sessions, even the grocery store!  I slept at the hospital when my son was admitted each week and went to work if I wasn’t there.  We fell into a pattern: I covered the night shift at the hospital while she covered the day shift at the hospital.  The couple days a week that we could spend as a family, we did our best to make happy memories with the children in case our oldest son died.  Meanwhile, my precious wife continued to have to get neurological tests run to prove she was fit to legally drive again!  She was told she could have a brain tumor or even a blood clot in her brain which caused her to become even more emotional on top of the pregnancy hormones.  Not only that, but when we had our sonogram of the baby, they told us they thought he had a heart condition that would need surgery at birth!  For months my wife endured invasive tests, grim sonogram readings and eventually dealt with gestational diabetes while our oldest fought for his life.  All through this ordeal she homeschooled all our children and helped them to thrive while I continued to work to provide for our family.  Finally, two weeks late, on ____________ 2014, our fifth baby made his debut into the world!  He was perfectly healthy with no heart issues!  He was a welcome ray of sunshine during a very difficult time.  My wife’s medical tests finally all proved that she was medically fit to drive but it wasn’t so simple to get back behind the wheel.  One month later our oldest son went into liver failure and my wife plead her case before a DMV judge and won her right to drive back.  The rest of the year was spent surviving and attempting to thrive as a now family of seven.  We finally figured out the key to our oldest getting chemo without becoming deathly ill and that was the best Christmas present ever!  We chose to celebrate this new-found energy by Christmas caroling around our block and in the pediatric unit at the hospital.

The beginning of 2015 was spent caring for one of our dogs who had jumped the fence and ripped her belly open.  We had to spend thousands of dollars to surgically repair her and ultimately chose to find her a new home which could give her more attention.  After this we decided we wanted to use our son’s diagnosis to do good somehow.  We helped promote Make-A-Wish’s Walk for Wishes with a radio interview as well as creating our own team to walk.  We participated in a documentary for the Seany Foundation to raise awareness for how important this type of camp outlet is for kids with cancer.  After 39 sessions of chemotherapy, a total of nine hours in surgery and 106 days spent admitted to a hospital, we wanted to celebrate the end of our son’s cancer treatment!  My wife went around and collected various donations from the local businesses and brainstormed the amazing idea of using our son’s end-of-chemo party as a Make-A-Wish fundraiser!  She created beautiful raffle baskets and had nearly all items/services donated providing an amazing experience of fun for our son’s celebration!   ________________ 2015 was the big party.  Little did I know what an important date that would be for me!  My wife and I were finishing last minute details for the party that morning and when I went to pick up donated water bottles from a local grocery store, I almost collapsed!  I was struggling to breath and not pass out but somehow I was able to call my wife and let her know I needed help and even made it back to our car.  My wife grabbed the water and rushed me home where my mom, who had been visiting from out-of-state to come to the party, took me to the emergency room.  That was the longest day of my life!  It took so long to be seen but finally, once the doctors started figuring things out, I went on the fast track to be diagnosed: pulmonary embolism in both lungs.  I was admitted to the hospital, had emergency surgery to remove the blood clots and was placed in the ICU.  Meanwhile, at the party, my wife raised over $_________ for Make-A-Wish!  She surprised our son with his wish sponsor presenting to him his full itinerary for his wish of choice, ___________ in Alaska!  Somehow our family survived that week of me being stuck in a hospital bed but it did cause problems at my place of employment.  When I was finally released from the hospital, I had to re-learn how to walk again.  My body struggled against my brain and caused me to struggle emotionally.  I wanted to give up but I pushed on because I knew I needed to be able to go back to work to provide for my family.  I did what work I could from home via computer.  Luckily, I was able to keep my job.  From that time on I have dealt with chronic pain in my leg due to a chronic blood clot.  Almost no treatment has been able to alleviate my pain but I continue to participate in life as best I can.  I used the Walk for Wishes as my first real exercise since my hospital stay and our team raised almost $__________ dollars!  Slowly, life was starting to get back to normal.

Finally, the week of our son’s wish trip to Alaska came!  All of our son’s scans had been clean thus far and we were looking at this as the beginning of our new chapter.  We enjoyed an adventurous, beautiful, amazing week in Alaska and the day after we came back couldn’t wait to go share our experience with some of our good friends.  Unfortunately, that day did not go as planned and due to an overheard conversation amongst the children, we had to sit our kids down that evening and discuss some serious, scary disclosures of abuse. ___________ 2015 will forever be known as the last day before our lives changed forever...yet again.  You see, those good family friends we had been visiting and had known for eight years, well it turns out that they had been physically, emotionally and sexually abusing some of our children for years.  The abuse had escalated during the year our oldest was in the hospital and my wife lost her license.  These people had “helped” us by watching our children during that time period but really they were hurting them.  The mom was my wife’s best friend and one of their sons was our cancer patient son’s best friend.  We went through all the drama of reporting to the proper authorities, getting our kids into trauma therapy, removing ourselves from various social circles where the perpetrating family still frequented, re-building safe circles of friends, etc.  My oldest son ended up needing reparative surgery during this time as well.  Emotionally, we have been stretched more than we could have ever imagined!  I never knew that my heart could break even more than when our son was diagnosed with cancer, but it did.  To make it even more difficult, I was fired from my job ___________2015.  I was out of work for one month before rallying and figuring out that I could do what I knew as a contractor.  Luckily, the same people who fired me for missing too much work due to family emergencies, were begging me to come help them again!  I have been working contractually with them since _________ 2016.  Our focus now is to heal and attempt to rise up out of the ashes.  We have five family members in trauma counseling, two that we have to pay for out-of-pocket, and most of us are struggling through anxiety or depression on any given day but we don’t give up!  We are currently in an open criminal investigation against this abusive family and waiting to hear if we will be going to trial or not. We also continue to have quarterly scans to see if my son’s cancer has recurred.   I won’t lie.  This most recent disclosure of abuse has been the most difficult thing I could ever imagine surviving!  But we are surviving!  We are trying our very best to live life and find our happy. We intend on attempting to turn these sour lemons into lemonade by spreading awareness about childhood abuse, discreetly of course to protect our children’s privacy.  We have found our new “normal” and have started to get back on top of life.  We are finally able to maintain a steady budget but have no ability to catch up from these past two years of failures.  Please, don’t add to the despair my precious children have already had to endure by not helping us keep our house.  We need your help; we just can’t stay afloat without a little extra hand up.  Thank-you for reading our story and God bless your kindness.

Sincerely,

______________________