Please help Marie return to life!

Hello dear fellow human beings,

My name is Antje Weltmeyer, I am Marie's mother and we urgently need your support.

Marie is 30 years old and has had ME/CFS (the most severe form of Long Covid) for over 4 years. Until December 2025, Marie was able to participate in life with severe limitations. However, she has been unable to work for over 2 years (we had to apply for a disability pension in January 2025).

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) is a severe, largely unexplored neuroimmunological disease that often leads to a high degree of physical disability. Characteristic of ME/CFS is Post-Exertional Malaise – a pronounced and persistent exacerbation of all symptoms after slight physical or mental exertion. For example, brushing teeth or washing hair leads to enormous exhaustion and symptom worsening that lasts for many hours. Therefore, Marie shaved her hair at the beginning of the year.

Since 1969, the WHO has classified ME/CFS as a neurological disease – the Covid-19 pandemic led to a significant increase in ME/CFS cases, yet the disease remains largely unknown, even among medical professionals, and very little research is being conducted.

She was successful in her profession, worked and lived abroad for a long time – all of this is now over. Two years ago, when she was already not doing well, her greatest goal was: crossing the Alps on foot – we are now light-years away from that…

Within a few weeks, she has now become a severe care case: First, she contracted Influenza A in early January, which kept her bedridden for 5 weeks. In mid-February, she had extreme back pain, and the MRI showed a herniated disc (she could only crawl out of the MRI on all fours). This was initially treated conservatively; on March 13, 2026, she had to undergo emergency surgery on the disc… 8 days later, a second operation took place, as something was pressing on the nerve again.

People affected by ME/CFS have a strong intolerance to exertion. Due to the two operations, hospital stays, severe pain, anesthesia, etc., Marie fell into a so-called "crash" on March 18 – a shutdown of the body. Since then, she has required care 24/7. Her partner and we, the parents, take care of her; our younger daughter (a nurse) is available around the clock with advice and help.

The situation has been and continues to be worse from day to day. Marie is in severe pain. After 3 emergency doctor calls (3 nights in a row), where she was treated with strong opiates, there was another desperate attempt to admit her to inpatient pain therapy – this failed. After 12 hours in the emergency room, we were sent home by ambulance again (Marie pumped full of Ketamine and Fentanyl just to survive the transport). Inpatient admission was said to be not sensible. Correct – because the renewed severe stress (noise, light, excitement, pain, strange environment, transports) worsened the crash.

Meanwhile, even emergency doctors must refuse any deployments - they say either she will be brought again to a nearby hospital, which are often overwhelmed by the situation, or no one can come by.

The notice from the German Pension Insurance for the disability pension is still not available. From May 5, 2026, to make matters worse, Marie will be completely penniless as the unemployment benefit expires. The pension insurance cannot send the notice because the health insurance company, despite repeated requests (surely 50–70 attempts, phone calls, emails, in writing), has not yet managed to give its consent to the start of the pension.

We have tried to find pain therapists, asked maximum care clinics to help, to get any kind of medical help – all without result.

Attempts to get a nursing service are also currently failing – no one feels capable of handling the situation. Palliative teams, despite the prescription of the family doctor, have declined support because their focus is on dying people – this is understandable. All the people I talk to on the phone or exchange emails with are affected, show understanding, but that's where it ends.

We are the only people who can currently take care of Marie, and we don't know how much longer we can manage it. The burden is extreme and our desperation is great.

The last blow came yesterday: The report from the Medical Service suggests care level 3 – meaning Marie could still do most things independently. Tears came to my eyes while reading it. Here too, we must lodge an objection, which will again take weeks.

We have had to hear multiple times now that our daughter "falls through the cracks" – this must not happen, it is 2026! Our daughter Marie just wants to live!

It is not easy at all for me to go public and ask for financial support, but in view of our reality, the lack of support from our health and social system and lengthy administrative processes, this seems to me to be the only way to enable the urgently needed aids and special therapies for Marie.

Marie is in all our hearts.
Every donation is like a piece of hope.

Marie needs an extra-wide nursing bed, possibly an electric wheelchair at some point (Marie is very tall, so it cannot be a standard model). We have already bought many aids to make care easier. Special therapies, such as acupuncture, possibly immunoadsorption (blood cleansing) at some point, could support her in finding her way back to life. The health insurance does not pay for any of this. Even medications, which are often "tried out" in low doses, are all "off-label" (outside the approved use) – which means they must be paid for privately.

Please help us so that we can pay for the treatments for Marie. Every euro counts. We want to enable our child to return to life.

We feel so helpless and Marie just wants to live…

We want to publish as little as possible about Marie's current condition and appearance, in order to preserve her last dignity – the sight is so sad.