health scare and healthcare

I know you guys are impressed with my mad rhyming skills! I've done it twice in a row now. That is what I learned teaching 1st grade. Haha

Seriously, though, I started to title this "where I rant and nothing happens", but it's my blog and rant and rhyme I shall. Kinda like it's my party and I'll cry if I want to.

So, I went to the dr. fully expecting him to sign my adoption paperwork and send me on my merry way with my much-needed prescriptions (let's hear it for premarin!). However, that is not what happened. Now, my doc is like 12 years old.........seriously, he looks about 25. I don't really know how old he is, so I have to just trust that he did, indeed, finish medical school. Just kidding, I'm pretty sure he finished.

He looks over my blood work results and says, "I hate to tell you, but there's something not right with your blood." He proceeds to tell me that my platelets are low. What's the first thing to pop into your mind? Yeah. Leukemia. Great. He assures me that I don't have leukemia. He thinks that it is some kind of infection. So, we re-did the test yesterday and I go back on Monday for those results. We'll see what happens then. We then have a conversation that goes like this:

doc: I don't think this will happen.

me (in my head): Then why are you telling me?

doc: But should you get a nosebleed, start bruising, get pinkish dots on your skin, or your gums start to bleed over the weekend, you should go immediately to the emergency room.

me and Steve (in our heads): Are you aware to whom you are talking? Of course, now, I will immediately get all of those things.

doc: Do not google this at home.

me (out loud): yeah. right.

Scary!

I immediately come home and google away.

The sad thing is that he is aware that we don't have insurance at this time. So, before he begins the aforementioned convo, but after he says there's a problem, he says,"Now, I don't know how we are going to handle this with you being self-pay."

And that statement is what gets me to the ranting part of this post. I know people are against federally-funded health care. Mostly, because the politicians can't keep their own personal agendas out of ANY bill that is passed which makes MOST of the bills useless. BUT, what are people like us suppose to do? Until I get a job, health insurance is not cost-efficient for us. You would think that my husband being a minister in one of the largest religious organizations around that said organization could offer something that people could afford. Oh, they have a Blue Cross plan that you can purchase.......to the tune of over $1000 a month for my family of four. That's if they would even cover us. The last time we applied, they turned us down because I take a 5mg pill for hypertension. A condition that presented itself 14 years ago when pregnant and has been controlled ever since without an increase in dosage in all of that time. So, I ask again, what are people like us suppose to do?

Illegal immigrants are covered. Pregnant teenagers are covered. People who live off of my tax dollars are covered. But, we cannot get coverage. What if something is really wrong with me? Do I just not get treatment because I have no health coverage? The stress of how to pay for any treatments has been worse than thinking that something is medically wrong. That's not the way it should be.

So, am I for federally funded health care? How about offering something for people like us on a sliding scale without punishing those who wish to stay with their own private insurance companies? I might not get the best care, but at least I could actually get care. Praying even harder now for a job in the fall so that I won't have this problem and certainly praying that perhaps there was an error in the test results.