MAYFIELD TWP. — Ed and Kim Goecke weren’t looking for attention, sympathy or an outpouring of community support when they decided to sell off their belongings over the weekend. They were merely doing, Kim said, “what grown adults do when they’re in trouble.”

An Elba Township woman stopped by the Goecke’s sale, and when she heard about why they were selling all their things, she knew she had to do something, and that started with a social media post that was shared more than 2,500 times from her page. That led to a flood of people stopping by to support the Goeckes and hopefully started the ball rolling for change.

Ed, 48, served in the Army in the Gulf War where he was, he said, exposed to insecticides, nerve gas, experimental vaccines and medications and more. He and others would volunteer to burn the garbage and human excrement to stay warm. The combination of these things and others, he said, are what caused his Gulf War Syndrome — a wide range of chronic and sometimes debilitating health issues that affect a high number of Gulf War veterans, yet have no specified cause.

“Right after (the war), all the signs started going on — the issues,” he said.

For Ed, that means nagging conditions like arthritis, fibromyalgia, extreme fatigue, auditory issues, an allergy to nearly all medication, and early-onset dementia, which is what caused him to stop operating heavy equipment just a couple weeks ago. That, he said, is when he realized things were getting dangerous and quit working, leaving his dedicated customers behind.

“I’ve dealt with it all these years but now it’s got to the point that I’ve gotten lost,” he said. “That’s why I quit machines. I could hurt somebody.”

Because he can’t work, and Kim has to stay with him, the couple decided their only option was to sell the business, rent out their home, sell off their belongings and live in their old camper.

Not long after the war, in 1993, Ed said the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) put his disabled status at 0 percent, and every appeal since has been denied. They have given no help at all.

“We’ve been telling them for months and months that we were going to lose everything,” he said.

“They just keep saying it’s not service connected,” added Kim.

But Ed said he has a stack of documentation from the national VA’s War Related Illness and Injury Study Center (WRIISC) that says his issues do stem from the war. Unfortunately, he said, that branch of VA services is separate from the branch that would give benefits, and the line of communication between the two is broken.

Their latest denial came Thursday night, so they did what they had to do, and put their life up for sale.

Elba Township resident Kathryn DeCou was attending a garage sale at Paradise Animal Rescue, and her son was looking through some old cassette tapes. A man came up and said, “If you like music, you should check out the garage sale up the road, over the hill, in the pole barn.” DeCou and her son headed over there and found exactly the items they’d been looking for, and DeCou started chatting with Kim.

“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I took notes and photos and asked their permission to post to Facebook,” said DeCou. “Quite frankly, this was a God thing. I am not a person who spouts religion, but I am sure that is what happened here.”

DeCou’s post went locally viral and people starting coming out to support the Goeckes in droves. They bought things, gave donations, and just offered their appreciation for Ed’s service.

“A woman who works directly for the VA in Detroit but lives in Lapeer showed up, badge in hand. She was ready to get to work helping Ed get the benefits he deserves,” DeCou wrote in a follow-up post.

In addition, another couple came from Sterling Heights after the sale closed on Saturday. Three other veterans stopped in, and that couple helped all four veterans complete forms that could help them receive their benefits.

“That was amazing,” Ed said.

There has been talk of starting a GoFundMe for the Goeckes, though there wasn’t one to be found on the website as of press time. If that happens, the couple said they plan to start an organization to assist these Gulf War veterans who are falling through the cracks of the VA system.

Ed said he has always been very patriotic, joining the Army Reserves during his junior year of high school. He did basic training between his junior and senior year, and returned to the Reserves during his senior year. After graduation, he went into active duty and gave what he could. If the VA was keeping up their end of the bargain, he’d be getting the assistance he’s entitled to.

“This needs to be focused on the VA and their troubles,” Ed said. “I’m not looking for donations. I’m not looking for money at all. I’m looking for the VA to step up and admit I have a problem that was caused by my time in the war.”

If Ed had received benefits even a year ago, he said, they wouldn’t be faced with the end of life as they know it and the beginning of an uncertain chapter of camping wherever they can find a place to stay. But, they’ve resolved to make it work, because that’s what they have to do.

“This is why we’re doing this,” he said Sunday at the sale. “We’re trying to be financially responsible for us.”