Peloton Bike to help Ashley’s Cystic Fibrosis

Hey everyone. As many of you know, Ashley has Cystic Fibrosis, a rare genetic condition that mainly affects her lungs and their ability to function properly.

She was recently diagnosed with a second lung condition that goes hand in hand with CF called Mycobacterium Avium Complex Pulmonary Disease. This is caused by mycobacterium bacteria getting trapped in the lungs and taking hold. Mycobacterium has many different strains and is found literally everywhere - air, soil and water. If a healthy person breathes in this bacteria (which we probably all have at some point) our lungs and immune system filter it out and we usually will never even know it was there. However, people with CF have lung damage that makes their lungs an ideal place for the bacteria to live.

Even though Ashley is healthy and takes care of herself, this bacteria could be detrimental to her lungs. Currently, her doctor wants her to take 3 oral antibiotics for, at the minimum 15 months plus inhaled antibiotics. Taking antibiotics for even short periods of time is hard on your body, let alone for this long and possibly longer. These antibiotics also come with potential serious side effects such as vision changes, hearing loss and neuropathy to name a few. The antibiotics also do not have a 100% chance of working as this disease is very hard to treat and resistant to many antibiotics.

We have done a lot of research on our own and it is potentially possible to eradicate this bacteria on your own with good airway clearance, exercise and healthy eating. This is where the Peloton comes in.

Ashley also suffers from Psoas syndrome. This affects the hip flexor muscles and for her in particular on her right side. She has been in and out of physical therapy for a year and a half dealing with this. Although it has gotten better, certain activities still cause it to flare up. The pain is bad and affects her sleep and day to day activities. Running is something that she has tried to do again recently for cardio, which is very important for her right now, and it causes the Psoas syndrome to flare up. Ashley needs an effective way to do cardio that will not aggrevate her hip flexor and she is able to bike with very minimal pain. I would love to get her a Peloton so that she has a way to do cardio regularly here at home in a way that won’t cause her hip pain and give her lungs a better chance of clearing the MAC bacteria without the invasive and long antibiotic treatments.

Ashley has done so much to “save” me and I want to do the same for her. Unfortunately Pelotons aren’t cheap and money is tight right now.

I would greatly appreciate your help if you could find it in your heart to help me reach my goal to get this for her. She has wanted one for a long time but needs it now more than ever. Any and all donations are so appreciated and I know she (and our whole family) would be so grateful and appreciative. Thank you in advance!