A Mommy Story

I’d like to welcome everyone who is visiting me from CNN today. And for my regular readers, go check out the CNN article – it’s got useful information for nearly anyone who isn’t self-employed. Of course, I thought that someday I might be featured on CNN for something I’d accomplished, and not because I have no health insurance. But hey, gotta gobble up those 15 minutes of fame somehow, and it’s better than being that guy on TV in his undershirt, holding a beer and talking about how the tornado tossed his trailer around like a tin can.

As a follow-up to that article, I’ll add that we tried to buy private health insurance when Aaron began his contract job in November. I researched, got advice from those who buy their own insurance, and then settled on a provider. After filling out the mile-long application, where I had to list every stuffy nose we’ve ever had, including full dates of illness and symptom, we then endured weeks of back-and-forth with the insurance company.

They insisted on bloodwork for Aaron because it had been too long since his last routine tests. The CNN article recommends not having tests run when you have a limited time on insurance, because it could hurt your chances of getting private insurance. However, I can tell you from experience that it doesn’t matter – they’ll get the information one way or another.

Apparently they found something in his tests, but wouldn’t give us the details. (Nice, right? You’d think we have the right to know about our own health.) Instead, we were told that he was denied any prescription drug coverage. He takes no prescription meds currently, and only took one for a short time in the 11 years I’ve known him. There were also several “pre-existing conditions” based on everything we reported to them, none of which were covered for the first six months. Seeing how I was planning to need this insurance for a year at the absolute most, I thought paying that much for next to nothing wasn’t worth it.

So at the moment our family has no health insurance, and unless we can find another job by the end of the month, we’ll be unemployed again. I’ve been saving anything we can spare from each paycheck to help us pay bills the next few months. Cordy and Mira can go back onto the SCHIP health insurance plan next month, too. I graduate from nursing school in June and will hopefully find a job with full benefits quickly. Then we’ll be back to where we were before Aaron was laid off last June. I can’t wait for that point – I’ve never been without health insurance before this, and this has been one of the most stressful times in my life.

I hope the layoffs across the nation begin to slow soon. No one should have to go through this stress, and no one should be without basic access to health insurance in this country.