State Made Poor

When my Mother passed away in 2006, I couldn't stand living at home anymore, I had to get away from all the reminders of her. My husband and I decided to settle in PA in 2007. When we first moved here, we lived with a cousin for 4 months, and Frank lucked up (or so we thought) and found a farming job. It was perfect, farming was what he'd done most of his life. The job included housing, free range gas, and spring water. Our kids had been staying with a relative in VA, so we were excited to be getting settled in so they could move home. For the first 2 months the job went well, but then there were changes, some small, some large, that happened along the way, that I won't get into right now.

A few weeks later Frank fell off a bobcat and hurt himself. The boss was out of town and wouldn't be back til the next morning, so first thing the next morning I went with Frank to the boss's house , just down the road. Basically, to make a long story short, boss man looked at Frank, told him he probably just pulled a muscle in his shoulder and back, that he just needed to work the soreness out. He put Frank in a huge field pitching rock. Some of these rocks were as big as a trunk, so I secretly helped Frank get as much done as possible so he wouldn't get into trouble. For 8 days Frank pitched those rocks, then when he came home on the verge of tears, throwing up because he's in so much pain, I had finally had enough, and I called the bosses wife. She and I had a heated conversation, and as soon as I mentioned calling my lawyer, she offered to make Frank and appointment at a doctor. I wouldn't agree to that, I told her I would make the appointment because I wanted to make sure it got made.

I called, told the nurse what had happened, explained the while situation, and she put me on hold. When she came back on the line, she told me to bring him straight on in, that he couldn't wait for an appointment. We went, the doc examined him, did some tests, and put him on light duty at work until the test results came back. Frank went back, gave boss man the paper with the docs orders, and boss flew mad. I'm not gonna repeat here what all he did say, but you get the point. Do you wanna know what the light duty was he gave Frank....pitching rock, shoveling manure, driving fence post, and pulling fence...etc..etc. That's not exactly light duty to me. Frank came home the next afternoon, and was in so much pain, he couldn't move his right side good, and he was throwing up again from the pain...I called the doc immediately. They wanted to see him again.

We went, and spoke to the doc. She said things had gotten so much worse,and was very angry that the boss ignored her orders. She ended up putting Frank completely out of work...when he told the boss, he fired him and gave us 5 days to get out of the house. We had 2 kids in school, how was we gonna do that. We took it to court and got an extra 30 days. During which time, boss man run the spring dry so we wouldn't have any water, knowing we had kids in the house. He said the needed the water for his cows, but his cows were in a fenced in lot with a creek running through it. We've got video of it. He made our lives miserable those 30 days.

We only had a little bit of time to find a place, and with Frank hurt, and us with no income, I made some calls to see if we qualified for any type of emergency housing in the area. I was told by the kids school to give CYS a call and if they couldn't help us, they could probably tell us who to call. Now, keep in mind, by this time we still had 18 days left in the house. When I called CYS, the opposite of what I expected to happen, happened. They informed me that there was nothing they could do to help us, but that if we didn't have adequate housing for the kids within 10 days, they would come and take our kids.

We are even more pushed for time now thanks to them, so we have to take the first thing we can get which is an HUD housing apartment. It was fine until we go to court to set Franks workers compensation payments. The judge decided, instead of paying what the job paid, and giving Frank the benefits he was receiving as payment for the job, the judge decides to base Franks workers comp payments on what he's currently paying out. Which was HUD rent..and we had food stamps, and had to go on the budget plan on our utilities.

Now because of that we can't afford to rent a regular place, and pay our utilities. We are living in a motel room for the winter, after spending the summer months in an 1971 18ft camper. Frank has had 2 minor procedures, 1 minor surgery, and is scheduled for a major surgery after Christmas in Cleveland OH. His injury is so bad, his doctor is finding it very difficult to find a specialist that will attempt fixing him. Pittsburgh is supposed to be the medical capital of the US, but yet they have to go as far as OH. Frank has already been told that he will never work again, and that if they can't fix his back, the only other option is to fuse his vertebrae and put a pain pump in, so the quality of his life may be improved. Basically, he's just gonna have to deal with it.

Our kids have had to go back to VA to stay with a relative again, because things have gotten so much worse with Frank and I. His injury, and my severe anxiety issues.

Going through the last 3 years of this, along with things I was already struggling with( which I am not getting into here) has caused me to suffer from severe anxiety. Social anxiety, agoraphobia, and several other things I have been diagnosed with, and have had second opinions about. In Oct. of last year I almost died. I almost vomited myself to death because my nerves were shot.The local ER wouldn't even hydrate me. They kept sending me home cause my tests were all negative. I checked myself into the hospital mental ward. I was there for 4 days, and the doctor immediately put me on Valium. He explained to me that once relieved, it was my responsibility to find a family doctor to prescribe it for me...he didn't tell me that feat was gonna be impossible...Now I am on SSI because I am unable to hold a job, because the state of PA doesn't allow the doctors to prescribe my type of medication. So what...am I supposed to be a hermit for the rest of my life. What about my quality of life. I could take care of my husband better if I were on my medication. The doctors say it's habit forming...well hell...cough medicine is habit forming...sleep aids are habit forming...and if I'm gonna be on it the rest of my life anyway whats there to be worried about. The doctors never even discussed other treatment options. The meds they give me for depression isn't working, because I'm not depressed...I'm over flowing with ANXIETY.

The bottom line is, we need help. This is not just another sob story, and we are not just looking for a free hand out. There is more to this story, but there is no way I can explain everything to you via AC, but if you know of anything that might help us right now please email me at lady.whiskey@yahoo.com. or you can call us at 814-516-3064.Thank You!!