- PLEASE HELP - Hello, my beautiful friends! Thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping me help Lorie Mae and her family. If you are reading this and you know me, then you will know that I very rarely ask for help. In fact, the only reason that I am asking for help now is because my limit for supplying funds out of my own pocket has been reached but the need for Lorie Mae and her own family has not yet been met and their needs are URGENT. Why them… well why not! I don’t want to become desensitised, and I don’t want to just put some feel-good band aid on a problem – I feel that what we do and how we show up in this world matters, and Lorie Mae and her family are in my sphere and have become like my own family, so here I am asking/ begging you to get involved. DONATION OVERVIEW: Any financial help given to this LFEBridge, whether it be $10 or $1,000 or more, will firstly go directly towards removing Lorie Mae and her family out of the slum where they live which is in the hurricane strike zone by the sea and paying the balance of small plot of land (398 sqm), survey costs and title transfer. Anything beyond that will go towards building a safe, secure shelter including water, septic, transport, and vital daily and future-focused needs such as schooling, heavy equipment training, education, medical treatment, and medicine. BACKGROUND: I am sure many of you already know this story, but for those who don't please read on... As fate would have it, nearly two years ago my life was changed when I met a young woman from the Philippines. I met her online, from a random comment that was made on a thread of comments on a Facebook page that I was following called Project Nightfall. She had replied to someone else's comment "How have you helped others" and in badly worded English she essentially said, "Why is it that it must always be me who helps others, when is it my turn now that I really need it!" I still remember the flash of anger that her comment evoked in me and in my arrogance, I remember thinking that there is "always someone who wants to make it about them", which was very closely followed by the thought, "What if they really need help". So I decided to find out. Firstly, I looked at her profile, then I worked out who her family was and what I THOUGHT her situation was. I then made a fake FB profile and made contact. I informed her what I had done and why and I asked her if she needed any help. Honestly, I don't know what I was thinking at the time as I had absolutely NO idea what her world was really like, and as I would soon learn, her daily suffering was beyond anything that I could imagine. At the time I met her, Lorie Mae was 22 and was 6 months pregnant with her son Lucas Fabian who is in the image of the campaign, and she also had two young girls under the age of 4. Both she and her father were detained in quarantine at a local provincial hospital in Santa Cruz Zambales, having both contracted covid and both being subjected to the very strict isolation laws enforced by the Philippine government at the time. In addition, because of these rules, no one was able to travel or work which meant her children and siblings had little to no food or supplies and no way of scraping together their meagre living to even try and make ends meet. Her father was also dealing with the burden of chronic diabetes and a blood disorder that resulted in him becoming a double amputee which eventually cost him his life, a fate that could have most certainly been prevented with better care and education. NO real help was on offer. As I would come to find out, they were abjectly poverty-stricken and were burdened with more hardships and trauma than I knew how to process, their full story is too long to be covered here but essentially it is one that reflects systemic, multi-generational poverty with NO hope of relief without direct intervention. However, what I thought of as hard then, was merely a drop in the ocean of suffering in their daily lives which was slowly revealed to me as I got to know Lorie Mae and her family better; hunger was a constant worry. Initially, I thought to contact local as well as bigger charities, however, I quickly found out what a waste of time that was and soon realised that if something needed to be done, it was up to me to find a way. So, I started to structure a plan, working with Lorie Mae, her husband Jhay Ar, various medical professionals and the advice of others, in order to really help them get out from the hopeless situation that they were in. At first, I was just putting out fires with Lorie Mae, Jhay Ar, and the children as they all required hospital visits due to illnesses resulting from poverty, and a lack of education and care. Conditions such as chronic and acute infestations of worms, infections, as well as major dental work with more than half of Lorie Mae's teeth being rotted due to poor diet resulting in severe abscesses and fevers, as well as blood transfusions for their son Lucas Fabian, the list was almost endless and felt overwhelming. The second stage was to start building up a foundation, which resulted in both Lorie Mae and Jhay Ar obtaining their ID's (this is a big deal for the poor in the Philippines and has major implications in their lives), supporting Lorie Mae in graduating from high school which included paying for a tutor, obtaining long-acting contraception, supporting Jhay Ar to obtain his license which has now allowed him to find part-time work and given him self-esteem, as well as other ongoing support to help with their ongoing hardships and MULTIPLE deaths of close family members that have occurred since I have known them - again all due to a lack of proper medical care and nutrition. WHERE WE ARE NOW: The next stage is where we are now and will make the most lasting impact, and that is to finally to move them out of the slum where they live in the hurricane strike zone, and provide a stable and SAFE home for Lorie Mae, Jhay Ar, and their children, along with their extended family of younger siblings that they are now the sole carers of since the death of Lorie Mae's father. Currently, up to 9 family members, all live in a 3 x 4-metre shack, including a child that they adopted off the streets, that is only 300 meters from the sea. At super high tide, especially during typhoon/hurricane season, the ocean literally enters their home. During hurricane season, which is happening RIGHT NOW and generally lasts from June till November, they will be wracked by winds that will rip off their tin roof, drenching and strewing their clothes and bedding and ruining anything precious that they have not saved. If the roof doesn't get ripped off (I have already experienced this with them twice), then the rain will pour down the walls of their home, be pushed in through their tin window cutouts, and flood the floor and everything in it - this is a common occurrence. When it gets really bad and if they have enough warning and enough time they will go to a community evacuation shelter, but sometimes they are forced to wait it out as they have no way of getting there in time or they are too frightened to leave in case they completely lose the meagre possessions that they do have. Often, they are afraid for their lives. This is NO way to live and makes it almost impossible to create a stable foundation for the children to build a future with hope. Finally, after more than a year of searching, we have found some suitable cheap land that has a title (this is a big deal and is hard to find at an affordable price) and a deposit has been put down. Your donation will directly help me pay the balance as well as start to build a home where they can feel safe. THIS WILL BE TRULY LIFECHANGING for the Canete- Mayo family and will mean that they can finally have the security they need to start to build something meaningful for their future. In truth, we will need significantly more to become stable and established and also have the goal of purchasing a tricycle at a later stage so that the children can get to school, and Lorie Mae and Jhay Ar can get to the market, as well as putting funds aside for the ongoing medical needs of Lucas Fabian as he was born with a form of inheritable anaemia. PLEASE DIG DEEP INTO YOUR HEARTS AND POCKETS and please pass this LFEBridge link on to as many people as you can- every last cent matters with the funds raised going directly to their care and assistance. QUESTIONS I have been asked: How do I know that Lorie Mae is real and is not scamming me? Firstly, I contacted her, not the other way around and I speak to Lorie Mae almost every day, sometimes, when things are tough, it can be several times a day. I have also personally organised treatment for her from here and have spoken directly to her dentist, doctors, tutor etc, and have regular Facetime. Why don’t you go through a charity? That was the first thing I tried, and it was a waste of time, they are totally overrun, and I soon realised that if I wanted to help them personally I had to do it myself. Now it is personal – YES I am emotionally involved – YES I am ok with that. If they are so poor how come they have a phone? They don’t have iphones. They have budget phones that they need for the basics. Initially, they were sharing a phone, but now they have one each. This one has been asked by those that don’t know me:- How do I know that you will use the money like you say and that it will go to them directly? Good question. The answer is that you don’t, so just give what you are comfortable with or if you know the person who knows me (probably someone who shared this), then ask them directly. Plus, I will be sharing updates, so please look out for them – including the land title. There are so many people who need help, why should I help them? Well, why not! This question reminds me of the starfish story. https://raycenter.wp.drake.edu/2018/06/29/the-starfish-story/ We can’t help everyone, but we can help those within our sphere of influence. By you coming across this story, it has now entered your sphere of influence; it is up to you to decide what to do about it. PHOTOS: The photos are real and most of them are recent. The ones that show Lorie Mae smiling are the most recent, the open-mouth photos down below are before we started dental work for Lorie Mae. She now has partial dentures and all of the family, including the children have had some form of dental work. I will also be updating them. If you have any questions please feel free to ask. THANK YOU!
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