RebuildAfterCrisisKerenKids

($15,000 for the next 3 months / $150,000 Needed to Partially Pay Emergency Debt)

Rebuilding After Crisis: Support for Keren & Her Children

Dear Friends & Family,

Just four years ago, my life looked extremely different.

By the beginning of 2022, I was quietly managing more than twenty-five doors in real estate, renovating and staging properties, running multiple Airbnbs, and preparing to open a wedding/event venue & accommodations on the 6.9 acre mini-farm we had under contract. (I was occasionally herding escaped cattle back to our fields, and living on our 80-acre farm we had under contract to sell.) We had just taken a family vacation to Belize with friends — and were preparing to travel to New York City and Dubai for nearly 2 months. (All using travel hacks, airline miles, and coupons, of course.) 

I had just finished over 50 credits toward my graduate degree in Anthropology and Archaeology from Harvard University (via their distance Extension program), and was only one course away from beginning my thesis-writing semesters to complete my master’s degree. I had already begun drafting my thesis proposal. 

I had experienced loss, betrayal, trauma, and other hardships that impacted many areas of life — yet, I thought those were all things that could be overcome in my overall growth trajectory forward. 

For my entire adult life, I have lived below my means — from humble beginnings with a first home bought for under $45,000, to an eventual quiet growth expanding our real estate portfolio and net-worth beyond 7-figures, building what I believed would be a multi-generational infrastructure. 

In the last decade, I had acquired a property for each of my children, which was intended to cover the entirety of each of their college expenses in the coming years. I had purchased additional rental properties in order to create passive income that would allow me the time to focus fully on them during their adolescent years. 

Now, they have nothing of this. 

I foresaw many of the economic constraints that seemed to be hovering on the horizon from 2016 onward, and attempted to prepare accordingly. I followed the financial wisdom to build a financial buffer I believed would protect my family from whatever the world might bring, and had multiple backup plans in place. 

But nothing in my life prepared me or my children for the events that unfolded beginning in 2022 onward.

The crisis that hit our family was not external.

It reached far deeper than the chasm between both ends of the spectrum of financial security and insecurity that I've tried to convey by hinting at numbers. 

It unraveled our daily life from the inside out. What followed was a series of crisis events — legal, relational, emotional, financial, and all-encompassing — with a fallout that touched every part of our being. 

It would be a vast understatement to say that these events dismantled the infrastructure of our world in what felt like overnight speed.

By July 2023, I found myself living for over a month at Safe Harbor’s shelter accommodations. My children entered the accommodations with me; but after approximately a week, they were removed from my custody (and were note allowed in the care of either parent) in July 2023. 

(Remarkably, my children all have happy memories of that week we spent together there — and my two younger children still view that experience as a “family vacation” during which their mom made them laugh about everything.) 

After a few nights of reunification with my children in August 2023, and the chance to sleep in my own bed and house again — it was less than a week, until my children were removed from both parents’ custody and all forms of personal contact with either parent for twenty-five days. 

We were told it would be temporary — and thought that "temporary" meant a few days. Yet, temporary became indefinite until nearly mid-September 2023. 

I was faced with the option of having my four children placed in foster care — and told they would likely being split up — or paying an hourly rate for their 24/7 care — with a then-stranger living with my children in my home, and sleeping in my bed — along with all the concomitant legal fees required to address this in court.

During that entire period of 25 days, I was displaced — literally and figuratively. 

It was a type of pain I had never felt before, nor even knew the body was capable of feeling.

I still remember being with my mother on the day my father took his last breath in 2009, and hearing her guttural scream the moment she realized he was gone.

I had never experienced my body involuntarily uttering such grief before — but the first night my children were removed from my custody, I could not stop those same types of screams from coming out of my broken heart, for hours, through the night, and well past the sun rising again.

I want to be clear that I am not sharing these details out of an attempt to disparage any parties involved — but to no longer allow my silence to be what prevents my children from receiving the support and care they deserve — I will address that in a note at the end of this post. 

There are countless details that I do not plan to share even if I were at liberty to do so. Yet, there are many more which I want to share simply for awareness and advocacy; but, am not legally permitted to share at this time.

Yet, it is my children who lived through the confusion, the instability, and the sudden loss of normalcy.

The details I am sharing here are not secrets from them. They were lived experiences for them — and my intent in sharing what details I already have is to open up more avenues of support for them.

During this period, I also experienced severe medical crises, including dangerously high blood pressure, seizures, raging infections, and prolonged internal bleeding resulting in vomiting blood/emesis. I lost half of my fingernails, hair, and overall health from overwork and duress.

On more than one ER visit, I genuinely feared I may not survive. My children had their own challenges, including ER visits and their immune systems adjusting to news schools while also carrying new life stressors. 

My children and I also had our medical insurance unexpectedly canceled/revoked. This resulted in accruing substantial medical debt for them and me.

I was able to negotiate some costs down, to get my children on Medicaid, and seek alternative remedies — but there is still lingering medical debt hanging over me. 

At the same time, the financial impact was devastating. 

Those who know me well know that I have lived well below my means for nearly two decades (from when our net worth was below 0 to when it went to 7-figures), all the while believing my then-present sacrifices would eventually provide my children with financial independence, freedom, and better opportunities for their future.

And for a moment, going into January 2022 — it seemed that the finish line for reaching those goals was right around the corner — and finally within sight. 

A vehicle I had saved up "sinking funds" for replacing (assuming it would last a couple more years) suddenly died, and I was without transportation during the start of the school year. But by then, my emergency funds had already gone toward paying the legal fees to get my children back. 

Nearly all of our appliances in the home stopped working and/or needed to be replaced. Our plumbing clogged, and our electrical wiring gave out.

I had over eight (8) flat tires within the span of 24 months.

(I am aware that much of that is not normal. Or probable.) 

I had prepared for some of this — but without knowing the extreme limitations I would be faced with when routine upkeep or sudden crises did occur — or what was to come.

My property was broken into and entered, and I had my/our belongings removed on multiple occasions. Yet, there was so much more that broke me in every way — but cannot be shared here for now. 

My insurance policies were canceled against to my wishes, my credit cards were closed out, and resources I assumed I’d have access to were cut off.

On multiple occasions, my utilities cut off without my knowledge or consent. 

The legal processes that began in 2022 have now accrued legal fees and legal-adjacent fees that have cost a combined over-$1 million dollars for the involved parties. 

(Four years ago, I would not have believed it if someone else had told me that was even possible. Perhaps not even two years ago.)

I am learning that there is often a layer of unbelievability and incredulity in conveying experiences like this, and that the credibility of such a story is further compounded by the removal of one's agency and autonomy to share updates as they occur. <3 

Properties I once managed disappeared one-by-one.

I was often doing the work of renovating, upkeep, listing/staging, then finalizing the sales of these properties all alone. 

The income streams I gradually built for over a decade ago suddenly dissolved. 

Somehow — it felt even more painful to be the one tasked with doing nearly all of the labor of dismantling it all alone. 

From 2022 through 2024, I worked beyond full-time hours, yet with no pay — hourly or salary — for my work. Nor was I reimbursed for shared costs of supplies, or the times I needed to hire a contractor.  

For a large period of that time, I worked 80-100 hours per week — often doing manual labor and renovating, painting, and working on properties, solo.

To try to meet the demands there, as well as being present for my children, I often skipped 1-2 nights of sleep per week just to try to handle the most urgent emergencies. 

I pushed myself far too hard, believing that perhaps my portions of any proceeds for properties that were court-ordered to be sold, would at least be worth the sacrifice of my future and health.

Especially,  if it could at least keep my children out of poverty. (It did not — yet, even if I had attempted to not work so hard; I was trapped and stuck in the situation in many other ways.)

So, I did the best I could within the circumstances I was unable to escape for over two (2) years.

During much of this time, I also did not receive any financial contributions or support toward my personal medical needs/housing/expenses, or to pay for my children’s expenses and needs. 

Despite years of careful planning and inheriting my father's tendency to prep for worst-case scenarios, I found myself and my children in a state of imposed-poverty nearly overnight — particularly following the time period after which my children were temporarily removed from my custody.

There was a rapid onslaught of substantial expenses involved in getting them back, which rapidly hemorrhaged my careful saving.

Eventually, it became a battle to keep the lights on, to keep food in the house, and to provide my children with a sense of stability through wave after wave of upheaval. But we did it, and are standing strong. 

Now, my children and I are trying to rebuild from the ground up — and also attempting to create slightly more margin to heal. 

I have had sole custody of them following our reunification in September 2023. 

I am thrilled to have observed each of my children thriving in new ways — even in ways I never imagined possible before 2022.

It is a genuine sense of relief to then to watch them heal from such recent trauma — in ways I once feared impossible. Yet, I know this will be a lifetime project for each of us. 

____

As a result, I am seeking to raise $150,000 to stabilize the essentials and restore basic safety and functioning for my family.

I realize that amount is high, and certainly don’t expect to be able to raise the entire amount via an online Fundraiser.

Much of that amount is intended to cover funds I have already spent/taken on with credit card payments — and accrued substantial debt amidst our attempts to survive. 

However, I will break some of this down to show specific expenses I am in immediate need to resolve: 

• Housing: a $68,000 payment to go toward an accelerated loan (not in my name, but FDIC rules complicate this) to save our home from foreclosure 

( even if it is not possible to save our home, then I will need these funds to procure new housing; my credit score was a 782 in August 2023 — but is now so low that I will not even qualify to rent any property for myself and 4 kids.)

• HVAC/Heat: $6,000 for a new HVAC system that needed fully replaced 

(has already been replaced — I need to cover the debt taken on to get it in an emergency)

We are still without working heat on our first floor, but are having fun and pretending it's yet another adventure. 

• Cost of Living from 2022 - 2025: $40,000 in credit card debt — primarily from the period when I was working manual labor work for no pay; and also did not have income or support to pay to feed, clothe, and house my children — and to continue to cover housing/living costs for when two different women lived in the house with my children.
  
  
• This was originally much higher, but I have already worked incredibly hard to already pay down over $70,000 of credit card debt!!

• Vehicle: $18,000 toward a reliable family vehicle that can also be used for my staging work/transport furniture
  
  
• $13,000 to pay off outstanding medical debt
  
  
• $20,000 to contribute to legal fees and payments (recent costs, plus, including a deferred payment plan for some of the outstanding legal fees/debts)
  
  
• $2,000 in outstanding extracurricular fees for all 4 children 
  
  
• $3,000 for school band fees (three children)
  
  
• $2,500 to cover payments toward my children’s extracurriculars over this past summer and the past 2 years. 
  
  
  • In just the past few months, we’ve also faced an emergency (oral) surgery, a stolen bike my daughter used to get to work, no working heat, unexpected vehicle repairs, and countless small crises that accumulate far more quickly when life has little to no margin. 

• $15,000 for the next 3 months: 

Alongside the financial needs, I am trying to fund a three-month sabbatical to heal physically, emotionally, and neurologically from the intensity of the past few years. (And by sabbatical, in this case, I still mean I'll be the full-time, single parent of 4 kids ;).)

I have been operating in extreme survival mode for so long that I now need to create intentional rest to recover enough to return to steady work and rebuild long-term stability. My body is breaking down. (My spirit once did, amidst all this, too; but that part of me is alive and well.)

Ironically, I was requesting to rest in 2022 after what I thought was already survival mode for several years.

During past semesters and also going into this one, I was continuing to work in various aspects of real estate — doing design and staging work for other clients, while also spending 4-6 hours a day covering transportation to school + band + other extracurriculars (4 kids at 4 different schools!). The regional real estate market has slowed down dramatically, thus slowing down my opportunities for work just as I need to pull back.  

I designed/renovated/staged over 10 properties/units within a period of under 24 months.

It is one thing to do that as an adult with support systems in place — and entirely another to attempt to do so while raising 4 children alone, navigating unresolved and disenfranchised grief. 

I  understand that times are economically difficult for most — and know there are friends and family who would otherwise wish to help, but cannot at this time.

I also wish I were in the position to be able to give like I have in the past. This experience has certainly further opened my eyes to the type of fragility life often presents us with. 

It is not like me to ask for help of any kind — much less, financial.

(So that either means things are pretty bad, or I am learning to get better at asking for support.)

As I have grown through this experience, I do realize that there are many who would love to help if they knew the challenges we've faced in recent years. I’ve also come to understand that my own embarrassment can’t be what creates the bottleneck(s) to my children flourishing as much as possible. 

In addition to the SpotFund campaign, we would also benefit from: 

• Funds sent to Venmo (@Keren-Threlfall
  
  
• Gift Cards to Doordash/Uber Eats
  
  
• Gift Cards for Uber/Lyft
  • (occasional instances I need to be transporting multiple kids at the same time, and can't get backup help)
    
    
• Gift Cards for Amazon
  
  
• Cash for Emergencies

These are especially helpful amidst extremely busy periods when logistics often requires us to be multiple places at the same time (as of the moment, I'm still the only driver); or, for when unexpected emergencies, sicknesses, or other crises arise and we don’t have the built-in support to be able to handle things with sufficient margin. 

A Necessary Disclaimer:

This post, request, or story is not intended to disparage any party or individual.

It is a minimal, careful disclosure of my experiences and my children’s experiences — primarily limited to what they personally lived through and observed — and what is necessary to broadly explain why we need support today.

My goal is not to harm any individual(s) or their reputation(s), but to ensure that my previous, prolonged silence for sharing the depth of trauma and loss in what has happened over the past few years does not continue to cut my children off from the community care, resources, and stability which they deserve.

The people who lived through these events — particularly, my children and I — already know what occurred to the extent of what I have shared here.

My children were present for the moments when they were removed from both parents’ custody. This is not news to them.  

They remember being told no one knew when they would next be allowed to speak to either parent.

They remember that their mother was not living in their home, and a woman they'd never met moved into her bedroom. The remember attending juvenile support groups with Safe Harbor.  

These are facts of their lives, not accusations.

Looking Forward

I share what I have now, because I also do not want my resilience to be used as the excuse for continued or ongoing, or institutionally-sanctioned harm — or prevention of access to care and resources for my children. 

Thank you for helping us rebuild — and for those who already have. 

Thank you for helping us come home — regardless of where home might exist in our future. 

— Keren

 

 

*The actual amount just for my legal fees would be much higher. I do acknowledge I had the privilege of at least having wealth built for my children’s future — and to have been able to quickly churn through it; though that loss is also traumatic and carries deep grief in knowing the cost it took to build my children’s now-dismantled future. 

**I was not permitted to share details of my personal life during parts of 2022 to 2024 — lots of the images here are from our mini-farm in Wellford. I worked as hard as physically possible to attempt to save the farm.

In the end, the kids and I renovated and sold it under a huge time crunch and deep trauma — but we still had it long enough that we had a final 15th birthday party there for Hana Kate in February 2023, and it felt nothing short of magical. We miss our cattle, and miss the connection with the land. 

A few days later, I loaded 4-5 Uhaul loads of my staging items, then unloaded and drove each load back to Greenville to put in storage... often while my kids slept, and I worked through the night. Those were such hard and grueling times — yet, so much beauty even amidst those ashes of dreams and life burned down. <3