When I was in my early 20s I found myself married to a wife who was a full-time student who couldn't work (due to brain dead immigration law), a $900 a month apartment, a car, an almost full-time job and a full-time class load doing my undergrad. I made, in my best year during that time, $16000. To say that we were poor was an understatement. An extravagant meal for us might be ordering the deluxe tacos at taco bell, or for an anniversary splitting an all you can eat pasta dinner at Olive Garden.

But we managed to just squeak by every month with about $5-10 in the bank at the end of the month.

We arrived at a point where we had to make a choice, have health insurance (the cheap one through the school) or pay rent and buy groceries. We chose food and shelter.

It was the wrong choice.

I came down with a mystery pain in my abdomen after recovering from a bad bout with the flu (which I had to work through or we couldn't eat). A night in the ER and a $10k bill later, it was looking like both my wife and I were going to have to drop out of school, we were going to have to break the lease on our apartment and move in with relatives, sell one of our cars and I was going to have to take on a second job sanding decks for $7 an hour.

It was too much to bear, my marriage went on the rocks, the relationship with my family and friends went to shit, I mentally shut down. All those years of effort, of dragging myself up the socioeconomic ladder. I became severely depressed.

Aggressive negotiation with the hospital saw the bills lowered to a still bankrupting but better $5k and a payment plan. It was the difference between dropping out of school entirely or dropping out for a semester.

Then the stars aligned. The bill finally showed up right before the summer break, meaning I could ramp up my work hours and work weekends and nights on a second job. My wife got her work permit which let her take on a part-time job. I got a dollar an hour raise.

We crunched the numbers and with aggressive belt tightening we were going to be able to pay off the bill and not drop out of school or leave our apartment. We worked like crazy, fevered, insane people. And then it happened.

We didn't know at the time, but the ER bill was not the final bill, some of the specialists also charged their own bill, and they wouldn't negotiate. Two 10 minute consultations with a surgeon turned into $500. An x-ray here and a couple lab tests and we were still out $1000.

We were broken people when those bills came. It was the last straw.

Then the next day, out of nowhere, a check from my uncle showed up in the mail for $1000. No strings attached. Pure charity. He had passed the collection plate at his church and asked for help, and those kind people each pitched in a few dollars to help people they'd never met before. And it was that church check that popped out of that envelope.

Everything turned around after that. Freed of the crushing medical bills, but now with two people working and one less car payment, we finished off our last year of school at a sprint, both got full-time jobs and never looked back. A year out of college we were making enough to buy a house and a second car again. Two years after that we moved up to a nicer house and a better neighborhood and have had amazing careers since then.

That $1000 kept my marriage together, got me a degree, kept me from possible suicide, it meant no turning back or crushing dreams, it was the difference between weathering the storm or being blown away by it.

Another job wouldn't have helped, I was working over a hundred hours a week. A loan just meant more debt I couldn't pay off. It was pure charity that saved the day and I'll never forget that life lesson.