Help Kendall Heal - A Journey

This is my sister, Kendall. She's 21 and she is a warrior.

(trigger-warning: sexual assault, suicide) 

This picture was taken on the plane to Ocklawaha, Florida before she checked into a residential facility for trauma victims and other mental illness/addiction on April 19th of this year. 20 days earlier, Kendall attempted suicide at home by cutting her wrists vertically.

Despite her doctors strongly recommending she stay at the facility for at least 2 more months, our insurance company has deemed Kendall’s treatment no longer medically necessary. Without any further coverage, her care will cost our family $36,000 for 60 more days. Although it will take a lifetime to heal, her current facility is providing her the coping skills she needs in order to leave this program with the necessary strength to live her life to the fullest.

We have 5 days to raise the first $10,000. We need $36,000 total to cover 60 days of treatment. We’re sharing Kendall’s incredibly private story out of desperation.

Kendall was diagnosed with bipolar depression several years ago and has struggled with mental illness for the majority of her life. To make matters worse, she has been victim of excruciating traumas that were deeply suppressed, leading to a diagnosis of PTSD earlier this year.

In 2015, she was sexually assaulted while in her own bed by someone she knew and continued to see on a regular basis. She was too afraid to go to the police and considered moving home but didn't want him to take that from her too. 

In 2017 she was raped in the back seat of a stranger's car. This time, she decided to press charges and after gathering strength on shaky legs, the Ocean City police department didn't believe her. They told her the attorney general saw no case and that the man who assaulted her would not be charged. Like so many other victims, she was shamed during the process, feeling like she relived the trauma in a new way. She moved home this time and lost most of her friends in the process.

At the end of 2017, Kendall's best friend from birth — her chosen sister — was tragically killed by a drunk driver. Kendall, like so many who loved her, doesn't know how to begin to grieve. 

In early 2018, Kendall mustered the courage to leave her long term relationship. He had been the one person she thought accepted and loved her unconditionally – something that she never allowed herself to feel – but the relationship was toxic and abusive. They had just moved in together. She made a home for them and then that was taken from her too. No compassionate person could blame her for giving up.

Over the course of 3 years Kendall had everything ripped from her with no time to process or heal. On April 19th, she was determined to take her own life. 

We are grateful every second of every day that she made it out alive.

After entering the emergency room, things continued downhill. She was physically attacked by another patient as soon as she entered the psychiatric wing, then involuntarily committed at Shepard's Pratt hospital because of the severity of her wounds. There she was situated alongside patients who were violent and dealing with other severe acute illnesses. The week she spent at Shepard’s only further compounded her mental state due to the environmental stress. She was released into the custody of my mom after 7 days but deemed too unstable to move on to a residential facility. She left without an alternative care plan beyond one appointment with her psychiatrist. My mom and I took shifts sleeping because we were terrified and unprepared for her to return home.

It was during this time that we discovered the facility in Florida after talking to their staff almost every day and comparing other possible programs. Unable to admit her until she was considered stable enough for that level of care, Kendall went to the Psychiatric Institute of Washington where she underwent intensive therapy. We fought like hell to get her in because it's one of two facilities in the entire country that is specifically geared towards trauma victims and those with PTSD. The have only SIX beds for women. After a week in their care, Kendall was admitted into the care of the Florida facility. Since April 19th, she has only scratched the surface of her illness, beginning to confront her multitude of traumas. 

Kendall's care team at the facility believe she should stay for another 60 days. They have watched her slowly open up and begin to show improvement, but the fact is that is has to get worse before getting better. For instance – on top of everything else -  Kendall was diagnosed with an eating disorder and has only started in ED groups as of a few days ago.

Many of us can relate to suppressing our experiences and maybe we wish we had support, too. She has just now begun to re-open her wounds and if she is forced to leave because we can't afford it - she will be pushed back into our world in a state too vulnerable to navigate it on her own. The activities and groups that she attends today force her to open up to strangers, professionals, family and now you, preparing her to re-enter the world. This has been incredibly painful for Kendall - someone who has never had the ability to face her feelings and see out the other side. The facility she chose is an incredible place - recommended to us by people we know, love and trust emphatically. They have been incredibly kind and continue to provide the kind of care she so desperately needs. She trusts her care team and she wants to keep fighting.

Our family is very proud and asking for help is agonizing and humiliating. At 3 1/2 years old, Kendall’s physically and emotionally abusive father left. Since then, it has been just us three.

Blue Cross Blue Shield has been reevaluating her need for treatment since she got there and despite her doctor's recommendation, each week she is warned that she only has 6 more days until she's discharged if she is unable to pay out of pocket. Every time she is told this, it sends her into a panic and she has to shift her focus to appealing her case to the insurance company instead of what she's there to address. We have completely tapped out what we, as a family, can financially contribute and the insurance company has set an absolutely final date of discharge for June 6th.

We have 5 days to raise the first $10,000. We need $36,000 total cover 60 days of treatment. We have been actively seeking help from insurance advocates, non-profits, family and friends and any resource we find within the mental health community. The three of us agreed, together, that our clock is running out too fast to wait for the system to work itself out. This is a plea from a family whose heart drops every time we get a call from an unknown number. This is a plea from a young girl who is terrified.

$36,000 is college tuition. It's a year's salary for so many of us. It's the cost of a good, reliable car. We know how ridiculous and unfair it is to have to pay that much for the essential services Kendall needs to survive, but it is our reality. It is not her fault that life has completely crushed her soul, she has been violated, she has been destroyed at the hands of cruelty. No one deserves the horrific things she has had to endure.

It's 2018 and despite small strides, there is still so much stigma around mental illness and victims of sexual assault and other trauma. The fight often seems like it will never be won for anyone suffering. We live in an age when insurance companies can arbitrarily deem that someone's time is up. Our system needs to change from the ground up, but it surely won’t be changed within Kendall’s timeline.

We have only 5 days to win our battle - not a lifetime. We are asking for your compassion and your help to give my sister the tools to heal and come out of this program with the skills and strength to rebuild her life. She deserves to feel happiness. She deserves to feel worthy of love and acceptance. She deserves to live.

Please consider donating and sharing her story. We are just the three family, like we've always been. The two family isn't a family we could ever fathom knowing. We cannot lose her, and we would never forgive ourselves if we didn't do every single thing we could to help her through this journey. That's why we are asking you.

Thank you for reading and for caring. I know many of you love Kendall, too. We can't force her to heal a certain way, but we CAN provide her with as much support as humanly possible, lifting her up until she can stand on her own. If you know her, you know that she brings something truly special to the world. If you don’t yet know her, hopefully - with your help – you’ll one day be able to.

(These images are were created by Kendall in her art therapy - something she truly enjoys.)