The Anxiety of the Felt Floor

Two weeks, two deaths of early aughts icons disclosed. After short periods of mourning and requisite social media tributes, the details of their financial circumstances became grounds for heated public discourse, and nothing was spared. Much like our forebears who took to the town square to jeer at their unfortunate friends and neighbors locked in the stocks and pillories, we use the comment sections and Reddit to air our grievances over their financial circumstances and to debate their 'worthiness' of charity. But while we lead with bluster and indignation, beneath that facade the same lingering fear persists. That is, what if it happens to me? 

Several weeks ago, James Van Der Beek, famous for his namesake role in Dawson's Creek and his movie turn in Varsity Blues, lost his public battle with colorectal cancer. He left behind a wife and six children. He also left behind a real estate portfolio that has been contested by the innerwebs, with a possible $4MM home in Beverly Hills, a $4.6MM rental ranch in Texas, and a mountain of debt from cancer treatment. He had 'very good insurance' and was a member of SAG-AFTRA. Despite this seeming material wealth, the cost of end-of-life cancer care for a roughly two-and-a-half-year fight can easily exceed $300,000. His family posted a GoFundMe after his death to cover his medical bills.

A week ago, similar news was announced for Eric Dane. McSteamy on Grey's Anatomy for seven seasons, then Euphoria. His battle with ALS lasted only 10 months. Two daughters, 15 and 13. His ex-wife paused their divorce to provide 24/7 nursing care. He was living in Johnny Depp's house rent-free because the money was gone. COVID hollowed out his work life, and then ALS finished it. Friends launched a GoFundMe for his daughters. ALS treatment costs an average of $143,000 a year. Patients pay between $80,000 and $250,000 out of pocket.

In both stories, the same pillars cracked.

Healthcare. The costs that overwhelmed everything else — the bills that kept coming after the careers stopped.

Housing. Both actors were losing or had already lost their homes. Van Der Beek's family held a ranch and a Beverly Hills property, but couldn't hold both against the weight of treatment. Dane was living in a friend's house rent-free because there was nothing left to pay.

Education. Their craft was their credential. Decades of work honing a skill with the expectation that more roles and more experience would convert to greater financial stability. It didn't.

Dependent Care. Dane's ex-wife paused their divorce to become his unpaid, full-time caregiver — and his two daughters still need raising.

Healthcare. Housing. Education. Dependent Care. These are the floor. And when the floor you assumed was solid turns out not to be, you stop building and start patching.

The public backlash was identical. The same disbelief and righteous indignation that a famous person could have these same pillars collapse, and fall through the same floor that the rest of us are standing on.

We want to believe that fame builds a financial floor. That enough success, enough visibility, enough recognition creates a buffer that the rest of us just haven't earned yet. It doesn't. Shannen Doherty lost her SAG-AFTRA coverage mid-treatment and publicly said so. Val Kilmer sold his New Mexico ranch, watched throat cancer take his voice, and with it, his ability to work, and documented the financial wreckage himself. These aren't cautionary tales about bad decisions. They're what happens when individual defenses, even extraordinary ones, meet structural forces.

Van Der Beek's GoFundMe raised over $2.5 million because 50,000 people recognized his face. But medical expenses are the single largest category on GoFundMe. One in three campaigns. 250,000 new ones every year. GoFundMe's own CEO has said the platform was never built to be a healthcare company. It is one anyway. The average cancer campaign raises $6,893. Fewer than 16% reach their goal. His family got a floor rebuilt because of fame. Everyone else gets a crack and is living on a link to share.

Employer-sponsored health insurance. Property with a mortgage. Decades of work built upon a skill, a craft, a trade. A family willing to reorganize their lives when the time called for it. Strip away the fame, and these families aren't so different from yours. We're told to assemble these very same financial products in our lives, achieve these same basic building blocks, and we're told that if we do these things, we'll have a stable floor when the unexpected hits. But as we can see here, that narrative is a broken promise.

The prescriptions are already rolling in. Build a stronger safety net. Design better insurance. Cap out-of-pocket costs. They're not wrong — but they're not naming the thing. The crisis isn't coverage. It's the discovery that coverage doesn't cover. It's the moment you open the bill, or read the explanation of benefits, or watch a famous actor's widow post a GoFundMe — and you realize that everything you were told to do wasn't enough.

Why are we so preoccupied with casting aspersions at people who have fallen on hard times? Why are we so quick to determine whether someone is worthy of another person's charity or if they should suffer? What does seeing suffering 'get us'? Is it because we're scared of our own fate, and we inherently know that the 'rock bottom' we may hit is far lower than we care to acknowledge? This is where terror management theory comes in. It is our internal defense against the anxiety of knowing we'll die someday, so we cling to cultural beliefs, find ways to boost our self-esteem, and distance ourselves from "losers" or frailty so we can feel immortal and superior. We don't like to acknowledge our own mortality, our own risk profile. This is why 68% of Americans haven't done anything to prepare for death: no will, no life insurance, no advance directives. And while 81% of us prefer discussing money over death, a striking 80% of adults 60+ know they lack the resources to handle even a single health shock without falling into poverty, highlighting our collective financial fragility at the end of life.

That's the felt floor. Not the absence of a floor. The anxiety of having one and not being able to trust it.

What would it feel like if your insurance actually covered what it said it covered? Not better insurance, but coverage that didn't require you to spend 10 months battling it out? Insurance where you got an upfront cost, and that was actually the cost. No surprise billing. No post-mortem charges.

What would it feel like to get a diagnosis and not immediately run the math on whether you can afford to be sick? To determine if it's cheaper for you to just die than to fight for life?

What would it feel like to care for a loved one without bankrupting yourself and your children in the process?

Or education or skills training where the payment is tied to better financial outcomes? Not a hope and a prayer?

We don't even know what that feels like. We've never had it.

That's not just a policy failure. That's a market failure. That's on all of us.

Because while we're arguing in the comments about whether James Van Der Beek deserved charity, 250,000 new GoFundMe campaigns are being posted this year for medical expenses. Fewer than 16% will reach their goal. The rest will share a link and hope.

The felt floor isn't cracking for celebrities. It's cracking for everyone. They're just the ones famous enough for us to watch it happen.