Help Monica walk and fly falcons again

Hi! My name is Krista, and I’m fundraising to help one of my closest friends - dare I say a sister in falconry - walk again.

If you know Monica, you know that she is one of the most generous, kind, and patient souls you will ever meet. She loves to bring people together and encouraging people. I know when I was feeling so down on myself with one of my birds, it was her that helped me regain the confidence to fly again. It’s time that we pay it forward.

In Monica’s words:

“Figured I'd post a life update since I have been so reclusive lately...

My life changed drastically on March 15th when a doctor urged me to the ER as he believed I had papilledema or swollen optics nerves. This is usually indicative of intercranial hypertension or worse - a brain tumor - so I rushed to the ER in a pannic. Well my MRI was clear so they attempted a lumbar puncture multiple times and failed (most agonizing experience of my life, first ER doc kept hitting nerves and the pain would radiate down my legs) so they had to call in interventional radiology to do a successful lumbar puncture. I had normal CSF (cerebral spinal fluid) opening pressure so they referred me to a neural ophthalmologist, the only one in Idaho, who quickly told me that my ER trip was completely uncessary. He told me I had tilted optic nerves which would lead others to believe they were swollen when measured.

Well back to those initial punctures - I have been having back pain at the puncture site since then, odd headaches that got worse as the day progressed, dizzyness, neasea, POTs like symptoms, and an incredibly stiff and painful neck. I could not for the life of me figure out what was going on and I could not make sense of my symptoms. I had two subsequent trips to the ER for these symtpoms where the possibility of a post dural puncture headache - caused by a CSF leak - was discussed but quickly dismissed. These are considered rare and enough time had already passed since the lumbar punctures. I was then treated for migraines, a diagnoses I accepted, and tried to move on but none of the migraine medications had any affect whatsoever on my head pain. I struggled to finish off the last of the semester and lead a normal life, but something was clearly wrong. I was eventually referred to a neurologist who quickly deduced that I likely had a CSF leak from those lumbar punctures I recieved at the ER (I was certainly punctured enough times). CSF leaks are a debilitating disease most easily recognized by orthostatic headaches, neck stiffness, nausea, dizzyness, etc when upright. The best way to explain CSF leaks is your brain and spinal cord are one unit wrapped in protective layers and filled with cerebral spinal fluid. This fluid protects your brain, which basically is kept afloat by this fluid. If you are leaking, you do not have enough fluid to keep your brain where it needs to be so it begins to sag in your skull and usually the only way to get relief is to lay down. The standard treatment for CSF leaks are what's known as an epidural blood patch. This is where they inject blood into the epidural space to "patch" the leak and encourage inflammation and healing. This is normally done a day or two after a lumbar puncture (or epidural) if the patient experiences headaches. We attempted the epidural blood patch, and it worked for a day, and then the symptoms returned.

It became clear that the doctors in Idaho were not specialized enough to help me. There are a few different specialists for my case in the country and my wonderful PCP doctor referred me to Stanford in Palo Alto California. It's a 6-8 week wait and that's where I currently am, patiently waiting to hear back back and hoping that the doctor accepts my case.”

We now fast forward to today: Monica has been accepted by Stanford. She has an appointment scheduled. This doctor identified exactly where the leaks were, and exactly how to fix them. He is extremely confident he can help Monica regain a normal life again. We are confident in his success rate as well.

However, Monica’s health insurance is not cooperating. Monica already had to reschedule the appointment/surgery to fight with insurance, and the insurance is insisting that there is more to be done in-network. They are wrong: Monica has lived the last 5 months, laying down 95% of the day, standing for 20 minutes in the evening to fly her beloved falcons Bo and Josie, and then laying down again. The in-network doctors are not able to give her life back again.

She deserves to fly and walk again. To be transparent of where the funding is going, here are the breakdowns:

Surgery cost:

$14,000-15,000

Transportation cost:

$500-1,000

Food + hotel stays:

$1,000-2,000

Any additional money fundraised will be donated to research for CSF leaks, or to another individual suffering from this debilitating condition.