My hellacious health care nightmare -- Obamacare has ruined me [View all]
I supported it until now but no longer.
Before I had very good private healthcare, not perfect, but decent. When Obamacare came along my healthcare provider pulled out of California. I priced other private insurance and they were all at least $200 more, some $400 more for care that was no better. I wound up with a Covered CA Blue Shield Silver PPO at the price-gouging rate of $650 that was a huge strain on our budget. That's TRIPLE what I paid just a couple of years ago, and about $150 higher than I was paying a year ago.
Then my husband lost his job.
He had 2 months severance pay but lost his insurance after 2 weeks. He couldn't get onto Covered CA so bought a COBRA plan. That apparently disqualified him from Covered CA for the rest of the year! He is also paying $650 a month. So together, with our only income unemployment we are paying 75% of our entire houeshold income on healthcare! We are earning just slightly over what it takes to qualify for Medicare, so that's not an option, plus in our area no providers are even taking Medicare due to low reimbursements, so I don't want that. They say we can't get off of it or onto anything more affordable until January by which time we could lose our house. Why on earth should someone with no job or substantial income not qualify for subsidized rates ASAP?
It gets worse. On Wednesday I was in a catastrophic car crash. A truck pulled out in front of me and I slammed into it at 40 mph. I thought I died; everything went black and I came to smelling burning (the airbag had deployed and crushed into my chest, feels like I could have a broken rib) My car is totaled. I can't get enough to afford anything else that's worth driving. I am hurt. I was taken by ambulance to a hospital not covered under insurance. I have a terrible plan under Covered CA and just found out its even worse than I thought. Today, still feeling terrible with sharp shooting neck pain and vision blurring, I went to the doc on my plan at the clinic 5 minutes from my house, where I assumed I could get care.
They said if I want to see an orthopedic specialist I would have to drive an hour away, through heavy traffic! From El Cjaon to Torrey Pines, for those who know San Diego. This is insane. I live in a major city just 5 minutes from a good hospital with great orthopedic doctors. I am in too much pain to go so far. This happened when my husband and kids were all out of town. But even if iI had a driver the pain is too much to even ride as a passenger and sit up that long. (People offered rides; I declined. I also have 2 big dogs, one just a puppy, and can't leave them all day to go that far, and felt like shit so just went home and drank wine until I could fall asleep. I was up all night last night because it hurts too much no matter how I lie down.)
I asked to change plans to a plan that would cover the closest hospital and orthopedic doctors. I was told I can't until January. I then said what if I refuse to pay the Covered CA and cancel the policy...can I go buy private healthcare to at least get the emergency care I need right now? They said you can't even buy private insurance now except during the Covered CA open enrollment period! I just sat down and cried and cried in the healthcare clinic lobby until they hauled me into a back room so I would stop embarassing them in front of other patients. Well they SHOULD be embarrassed.
How can this be happening in America? In California? If anyone here has any connections to the Obama administration, someone in the federal healthcare offices, or someone high enough up in CA to help please, please let me know. I did complain to my Assemblymember, a caring Dem who headed the healthcare committee in CA, before my accident and her aid said there is nothing they can do because the laws that are giving us trouble are all federal.
It's not the Republicans that screwed me over, it's the DEMOCRATS by taking away my good healthcare and sticking me with a piece of shit policy that's not worth the paper its written on. So I'm paying $650 a month for a plan I've never even used for anything significant and when I slam into a truck and injure my neck, I can't even get care!
What can I do? Who can I complain to? Can any help me, act as a liaison for me, do something? My health insurance agent has tried and tried to help but she's just hitting dead ends too. What if something really bad happens, like an embolism or clot like people can get after bad crashes? Where do I go? What do I do? I found out the only hospital covered is an hour from here!
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