Help Brenda get to headache clinic

While my wife Brenda Mueller was working on her college degree at 50 years old, she woke up one day in May 2010 with a bone crushing headache...much like what is termed as a "spinal tap" type of headache that feels like a heavy weight is sitting on her head 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

That headache has been with her every minute of every day ever since. She was unable to finish school (with just one class left), unable to work and been deemed permanently disabled by our government, having exhausted all local in-network healthcare options including futile efforts with nine different neurologists, and even with insurance our life savings has been depleted and been forced to go into debt, we trying to find an answer to what has turned both our lives upside down. While working full-time, I am Brenda's full-time and only caregiver.

No one has been able to diagnose the problem saying the last best chance is a specialized neurological and headache medical facility like Chicago’s Diamond Headache Clinic, the University of Texas Southwest Neurology Clinic here in Dallas or the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland or at one of their Undiagnosed Disease Network satellite facilities like in Houston. The problem, however, is that many facilities potentially able to help her don't accept her type of insurance and cash payment is often the only option.

I am trying to raise funds for an initial visit, hopefully subsequent diagnosis and a treatment plan (along with travel and housing costs during diagnosis and treatment while away from home as necessary) that would let her get off opiate infusion (pain pump) therapy -- the only thing that keeps her out of bed most days but ravages her body and autoimmune system -- and address other ailments, including Rheumatoid Arthritis, Osteoporosis, Fibromyalgia and a variety of gastrointestinal complications that are exacerbated by the pump. The goal is to make her free of opiate pain therapy; and while her cognitive functions will never fully return to what they once were, hopefully she can return to a more normal and fulfilling life than she has now.

Once that is achieved, Brenda intends to pay forward the generosity of others who will help with her recovery to utilize any excess funds and her own time and efforts to work for those who are caught in the same nightmare she has been trapped in for the last five and a half years.

Thank you in advance for your kind and generous donation and whether or not you can help financially, please pass her message on to those you know who might.