Many of you have been following the story of my dear friend David Wilder and his battle with cancer.  My last post about this (Another update on my friend and my mother-in-law ) spurred some of my AR friends to action, and for that I am eternally grateful. 

Several people emailed or commented that they would be willing to give money to assist David and his wife, Jan, with their expenses and debt as a result of David's two cancer treatments in 2007, as well as the surgeries that he has undergone over the past few months. 

To the left, you can see a photo of David and Jan before his illness hit. 

My friend in Tennessee, Melissa Grant, has taken things a step further, by volunteering her time and money to coordinate a fundraising effort for David by selling "Friendship Pins".  She is willing to purchase all of the materials necessary for this, as well as ship the pins to those who purchase them.  Please see her post about this here for more details on how to donate via this program:

AR Member Jason Crouch...NEEDS OUR HELP for his friend DAVID WILDER - Please feel free to copy her post into your own blog if you like, or link to it as I have done here.  The same goes for this post of mine.  We are really just trying to spread the word as much as possible.

If you are willing to donate ANY AMOUNT of money to help, it would be appreciated.  I have witnessed firsthand how the collective efforts and generosity of ActiveRain members have been instrumental in helping fellow members several times during my seven months here, and I hope that this is no different. 

The photo below was taken before the surgery they performed to remove David's tongue and vocal chords back in November.  According to Jan, he has lost a good deal of weight since then (about 110 pounds total).

David had NO health insurance when this happened, and the mountain of debt is unthinkable at this point.  I am really just trying to help them with their basic expenses (mortgage, utilities, food, gas, etc.).  Jan cannot really work full-time because she needs to be available to care for David at this point, until he can hopefully be back at full strength.  Right now, she works at a small local church near their home. 

When I last visited them, Jan mentioned to me that she was thinking of posting something on her own blog as well, and she said that even $1 per person reading her posts would help right now.  Considering the limited reach of her CarePages blog, this almost brought me to tears in front of her, as it would probably only be $100-200 total.

Frankly, David has been one of my biggest encouragers over the years that I have known him, and I would love to provide a small measure of this help back to him as he goes through this extremely difficult season of his life.  When I was first considering getting my real estate license, I spoke with David (who is a lifelong salesman) and his enthusiasm and his supportive comments in late 1996 helped me to make the final decision to dive in to this business headfirst.

The photo below was taken about a week ago, and Jan shared this on her blog.  She called it his "mad scientist" picture.  You can see the extreme swelling in this neck from the most recent surgery.

If you are unable to give money right now, but you would like to send a note or card instead, I know that they would be happy to hear that they are in your thoughts and/or prayers.  Any correspondence like this, along with any checks or money orders can be sent to them care of my address, which is below:

Jason Crouch, 3636 Executive Center Drive, #210, Austin, TX  78731

Please make any checks or money orders payable to Jan Wilder.

If you would prefer to send money to them via PayPal, their account is set up under the following email address: jwilder_99@yahoo.com (there is an underscore between "jwilder" and "99"). 

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me on my cell phone at 512-796-7653 or email me at jason@austintexashomes.com. 

Thanks in advance for ANY help that you are able to provide, as I know that many people are going through tough financial times right now.