Community, Please Rally Round

I have a very serious favor to ask of all my readers.

A very good friend of mine is in a very bad way. Due to a combination of severe chronic health problems, and the fact that the makers of the drug Cipro failed to warn consumers of crippling tenosynovitis as a side effect of its use, she is completely disabled and in terrible pain:

Along with the physical loss of the use of most of my fingers, my left hand, and now the right hand, is the most mind-bending pain I've ever experienced. To touch or accidentally brush against anything can make me cry out despite myself. It's the kind of pain that brings you close to vomiting, to going insane, to chewing into your own flesh like a mortally wounded animal.

Every day a new area of attack emerges. It's spread from my left hand to the right, throughout my left arm, left shoulder, left rib cage, both elbows, both knees - front and back - both ankles, both Achilles tendons, and now both feet. This morning it had hit my left lower back. Tonight, just now, I felt it pulling throughout my left leg. All these for the first time, all in the last few weeks.

At the same time, her husband is disabled because of a work-related injury after a heart attack, and both workman's comp and disability are screwing them over:

We're like so many other Americans, living paycheck to paycheck; if one paycheck stops, life can spiral out of control with horrifying speed. We're there. Walter's Worker's Comp was cut off on a spurious basis. Yesterday came a letter saying his disability claim was denied. The basis? They said his disability was from a work injury, so go apply for Worker's Comp.

Like so many others in this disastrous economy, Joe and I are hanging on by our fingernails, with the help of good credit, good health, family, friends and community. We can't wait for the government to step in and solve this; we've got to help our friends in need, RIGHT NOW. This is my friend and she is in need; I have just sent her the amount of my monthly blog income (from the Russian brides, in fact). I can vouch for her character.

Please hit her tip jar NOW. The money will go for food and medicine.