Wednesday, September 3, 2008

For the first time in 11 years........

I'm unemployed. It feels.....great! and strange. There is still the HUGE worry of no health insurance. Chris works for a firm that is just him and his boss, so he gets no benefits there. That was why I worked. I provided health insurance for my whole family. And the bank had great benefits. I worked 20 hours a week and I got full medical, dental, and vision for all four of us. We knew that we would eventually have to buy our own. The thought of being at the bank for the rest of my life....was.....depressing. So why not now??? We're almost ready to open The Treehouse and I need to focus on that. But now....come to find out......I can't find insurance to cover me. I have been diagnosed with Sjogren's Syndrome. I found out when my first daughter, Ryan was born. She was born with a bad rash on her face and after seeing a dermatologist, he determined it was neo-natal lupus. He looked at me and ask me if I have lupus. I said no. After two weeks of blood tests, they pin pointed it to be Sjogrens. I had no symptoms, so I didn't know I had it. Basically, it's an auto-immune disease that attacks the moisture glands in my eyes and mouth. So...I have dry eyes and dry mouth. Nothing unbearable, but this is the reason we won't have anymore children either. Ryan was very blessed that all she had was a rash and we were even more blessed that Reagan came out perfect! But now we have a 50% chance that the next child could have a major heart defect and require a pacemaker put in with days of being born. That's a risk I'm not willing to take. We have been blessed with two healthy beautiful daughters and I am grateful for that.
So back to getting insurance.....no one will cover me because of SS. I didn't realize having dry eyes made me a menace to the medical world. They'll cover someone with AIDS, but not cover my eye drops.....which I just buy over the counter. So what am I going to do?? I'm going to use up my COBRA benefits through work and then someone will be forced to cover me, but it's going to be expensive. I can see myself returning back to work get on a group plan that will cover me. Sad.

8 comments:

Amber said...

Yeah for quitting the crazy banking world. I thought for sure I would miss it, but I really haven't at all! I do however miss the benefits. Mark has amazing insurance (which is the only reason I am able to stay home!) and I did too through the bank, so with double coverage we would end up getting checks in in the mail after both in insurances had covered their part. Sure do miss that!

Seems silly to me that they won't cover you. Mark has type 1 diabetes and most companies cover him (and having diabetes is EXPENSIVE!!). Hopefully you find something. And maybe you guys will be raking in so much money from your brilliant business idea that you won't need to worry about the cost of insurance! :)

Chredna said...

Thanks Amber!! I'm praying for oodles of money coming in....is that bad? Pray for money to pay for doctor's visits????

Linsey F said...

Don't regret quitting. It will all work out. Things may just be challenging for a while...(I know how that goes) Pray and pay your tithing and everything will fall into place!

Anonymous said...

Amber

Keep in mind that you had this autoimmune condition when you had your children, and they didn't need pacemakers. It is a very very rare complication.
Sjogren's effects about 4 million in the usa as of about 4 years ago.

For more info see www.sjogrens.netfirms.com

Anonymous said...

An unemployed Edna? Wow! I can totally understand why your dry eyes would cause you to be a menace to not only the medical world, but society as a whole...You might be driving a big car down the street when your eyes are suddenly overcome with dryness! You must shut your eyes momentarily causing you to loose complete control of your car, striking tens of passerby. It would be complete devastation! Oh the HORROR!

But seriously, I'm sure it will all work out. You and your funky eyes and your family will be just fine:).

Tia said...

this post is filled with so much I felt i needed some time to soak it all in. First what a good friend i am I didn't even really know about your condition. Good choice you made with the kids thing I was going to say the insurance is really going to screw you up in that department but you don't have to worry about that. So to answer your question yes we have private insurance you know high deductible small monthly payments but no maternity insurance it's soo expensive. Anyway welcome to the world of paying for insurance it kinda sucks. My first two babies were 250 each for my c-sections.

The McEwen Family said...

Oh how sad. I didn't know you had that. I hope you find someone to cover you. I guess we are so lucky and blessed that we have full coverage and never have to pay for things and I'm glad sometimes for the military!

Becca and fam said...

Sorry to hear about the health insurance. BUT good luck with the Treehouse. You guys are going to do so well with that. We were wishing there were one here. I'm sure it will be very lucrative. Good luck!