Carrianne Chase’s fondest memory of her mother is that she used to smile all the time.
But now she doesn’t.
“Before the disease took its toll on her life, the smile in the picture is the smile you used to see. You don’t see that anymore,” Chase, a Sinclair Community College student, said. “People do but that is not a real smile. That is my mom putting on a fake because she doesn’t want people to worry.”
In the early 1990s, Rita Gault, alumni of Sinclair, was diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease.
COPD is a lung disease that with time gets progressively worse and makes it difficult to breath; it is most likely caused by smoking and is the host for other diseases such as, bronchitis and emphysema, which has caused Gault to require oxygen all the time.
Due to her declining health, she is undergoing evaluations at the Cleveland Clinic to get approved for a new lung.
“This is her life and when you are having a lung transplant you have to be ready spiritually, mentally and physically. She needs both lungs replaced, but she has to replace one at a time and she is not ready,” Chase said. “But if her body was to reject the new lung, she would still have one of the bad lungs and be able to live versus getting both lungs and her body reject it and then she dies, and we don’t want that.”
But Gault’s struggle and hope for a new life comes at a high price, Chase said.
“A lung transplant costs approximately $45,000. And she needs two. Insurance doesn’t pay all of the medical expenses,” Chase said. “If her body accepts the lung, she will need follow-up care and daily anti-rejection medication. The medicine is as vital to her survival as the transplant itself. But we need help.”
On July 7 and 8, Chase is having a fundraiser yard sale and is in need of donations of goods to sell. She said she needs goods that are household items, tools, cookware, lawn equipment and baby furniture because those items sell quickly.
For more information call 520-4157 or email her at cariannechase@yahoo.com.
All donations will be tax deductible and a receipt will be provided for every donation that is provided.
The fundraiser yard sell will take place at Van Buren Apts. The address is 1448 Tabor Ave. Kettering, Ohio.
To make cash donations visit www.transplants.org/donate/ritagault.
Chase said she never had to ask anybody for help but now she does.
“We need help from the community,” she said. “That is hard for me because I don’t want to lose her. But it is difficult to know that your parent has just been given a timeline and that you are doing the best that you can but still need help.”