Hopefully Someone, Anyone, Will Hear Our Story...

Recently ABC "World News Tonight" did a story about the Mortgage Crisis going on, & they are asking for people to write in & tell of their financial worries. Tonight, I posted this on their message board...

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=4210602&page=1

My Families financial issues are a little different than what I've read here so far, so I figured I would add my comment as well. Our home is going to be sold at auction tomorrow 2/4/08. We didn't get into a mortgage that was above our means. We weren't in an ARM. We aren't maxxed out with Credit Card debt, as a matter of fact we have NO credit card debt. Our home was purchased in 2003 for $80,000 (we live in NC as well). We had a fixed rate of 7.25% for 20 years. Our payments were $830/month including taxes & insurance. Our trouble began when we took my Mom in who is mentally & physically disabled & was unable to care for herself independently. Did I have other options? Sure, I could have put her into a full time care facility, but she's my Mom & I chose to keep her home with us. We got behind when her Medicare Part D initial $2450 ran out & she fell into the "Gap". We then had to start paying full price for her medications, which some months were in excess of $3000 & her income (SS & my deceased fathers pension) was less than half that amount. We did look into Medicaid & some of the drug companies that offer assistance & we were told that my Moms income was too much to get help...??? YET, had she been on her own, she would have never been able to survive. We filed bankruptcy in January of 2007 in order to save our home. Two days later, my husband, who is an Over the Road Truck Driver was diagnosed with Type II Diabetes & was sent home on temporary disability. It took almost 2 months to get his first check, in the meantime we got even further behind. In March of 2007 our daughter (7 at the time) had to have her tonsils & adenoids out & tubes put in her ears. I have Crohn's disease, I was diagnosed when I was 16 (I'm 39 now) & also am on medications that there are no generics for - I'd like to add here that Crohn's tends to be affected by stress. So I guess according to some peoples standards or opinions - we were living above our means by getting sick??? I mean after all, if you can't afford it you don't get it right?! We certainly couldn't afford all the illness in our house!!! I recently sent in an application & video to "Extreme Makeover Home Edition" nominating a community based program that helps families like mine dealing with Role Reversal - Adult Children Caring for Disabled & Elderly Parents. My Mom had been on the waiting list for this particular program for about 1 1/2 years. When her care & our finances were finally too much for us to handle, I had to accept defeat & have my Mom put into an Assisted Living Facility. This decision was not easy for me, but we were out of options. Now in the final days of 'home ownership' I have been emailing our story to anyone I could find email addresses for including - local radio stations & local news stations - so far nothing promising. It all comes down to this: It was MY decision to help my Mom, my husband never once said she had to go or that he was done, all he ever wanted was to make ME happy!!! What did he get in return for that - I LOST our home, for helping my Mom, I did what I thought I was supposed to do. Am I perfect - NO, over the course of the past few years I've made plenty of mistakes concerning my Moms mental illness, mainly because I was ignorant to what was involved & her patterns & behaviors. I made decisions for her based on what she WANTED rather than what I knew she NEEDED. When I started doing my own research on her illness is when I started making decisions based on what she NEEDED, but by then it was too late! I feel like if we had lived in one of the 'mini mansions' we keep seeing people lose, we'd have a much better chance of surviving this - the solution would be to downsize! We are not in a position of downsizing - our mortgage payment was only $830/month I can't rent for less than that here. I don't have a brand new 'Escalade' or some other luxury anything to trade in either, we may end up in our falling apart, 2000 Explorer. My thoughts & prayers go out to the 18 or more other families in our community who are also on the waiting list for that very same program my Mom was waiting to get into. I hope that help comes soon enough to atleast help them. I'm done!
By: homelessinNC