My Adventures In Health Insurance

I’m uniquely qualified to talk about healthcare.  In the past 25 years I’ve been disabled and non-disabled, diabetic and ex-diabetic, insured through employers, Medicare, and no one.  In the past couple of years the subject of socialized healthcare has been a divisive issue here in the U.S.  Aside from brief discussions with a few people I’ve kept quiet.

But the time has come for me to jump into the fray.  Lucky for me, I’ve got insurance if the fray hurts me.

My Type 1 Diabetes was a pre-existing condition (from age 12) which meant my employers’ insurance chose to ignore that area of my health needs.  I paid for the testing supplies, disposable syringes, alcohol swabs, and two kinds of insulin myself—when I could.  There were a few times when I had to use the syringes twice, risking infection.

And that was when I had insurance.  There were times when I had to cough up (pun intended) the cash to pay for every doctor’s appointment.

When I was 27, the diabetic complications started.  My vision and my kidneys started failing.  I had no problem proving I was in bad enough shape to get Social Security Disability.  Not long after that, Medicare became my only health insurance.

This is the part most lifelong healthy people miss.  If someone with a chronic health condition can’t get the help they need to take care of it, they can become disabled.  I went from paying into the system to being a consumer.  Maybe it was inevitable, but it could have happened later and I could have paid more to Social Security before needing it.

To keep from losing SSDI and the Medicare that comes with it, I worked part-time at a number jobs for which was severely overqualified and under challenged.  A diabetic with failing kidneys can’t expect a private insurer to go near them.  A VOUCHER WOULD NOT HAVE MADE ANY DIFFERENCE.  A voucher does no good if no one will take it.

Medicare paid for the kidney/pancreas transplant.  I was lucky enough to have people willing to help raise the money for the unpaid part of the surgery.  Not everyone is so fortunate.  I don’t even want to think about how a private insurer might have tried to dodge the whole issue.

Medicare also paid for a second transplant, four major eye surgeries, laser treatments, dialysis, and a host of other less serious procedures.

In 2004 I landed a state job and employee health insurance started paying for the deductibles and copayments.  Now that I’m a retired state employee, I’m covered by Medicare and private insurance.  I’m one of the tiny percentage of disabled people fully covered by insurance.

I can remember when my situation wasn’t so comfortable, which is why I don’t have that “I’ve got mine, Jack” attitude I hear too often from the chronically healthy.

Even if you don’t have a chronic health condition, an accident or sudden illness could make it impossible for you to work.  Then where would you be?  You’d end up with socialized healthcare.  You would be persona non grata to the private insurers.

You say you’re really careful?  You eat right and exercise?  Great, but your luck could run out.  Yes, luck is a factor, too.  A drunk or distracted driver could crash right into you.  Don’t let luck make you smug.

There’s an old saying, apparently forgotten my many: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.  Keeping people healthy is so much cheaper than playing catch-up later.

Not only do most healthy people work, they further their education, volunteer, and some even start businesses.

I’ve heard people say, “We can’t afford to cover everyone in this economy.”  With two-thirds of us overweight, we can’t afford not to.  Here is the Land of the Free it’s “eat now, pay later.” 

Well, I’ve seen the bill myself.  Millions of us won’t be able to stiff the restaurant and do a Dine-N-Dash this time.

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Finding Out Someone Would Save My Life

Because yesterday was the ninth anniversary of my second kidney transplant, I thought I would share an excerpt from my book, which is in the final editing process.  Maybe it's fitting that it will probably be published in September.  It's a month of intense highs and lows for me.

Blindsided

Why is the word always associated with an unwelcome surprise?  The term comes from something approaching from outside your field of vision, your “blind” side, catching you off guard.

     It’s a situation I am only too familiar with.  With non-existent peripheral vision, people and objects always seem to come out of nowhere.  I get blindsided almost every day.  It can cause everything from mild surprise to injury. 

     But, it’s possible to be blindsided by something good.  Out of nowhere, exactly what you need.  Sometimes, it’s far beyond what you hoped for.  You find yourself saying, “I never would have expected that in a million years.”

     Chance?  Maybe.  Luck?  Probably.  God?  Yes.

     There’s no other explanation for an unexpected gift so completely unselfish that it leaves you shaking your head in awe.  A gift of such profound generosity that Hallmark doesn’t make a greeting card to express the gratitude you feel.  That’s divine intervention.  That is all the proof anyone needs for the existence of a mysterious, but loving God.

     I guess you could say God made me legally blind—and has blindsided me over and over since then.    

 

Connie

     My parents and I sat in the waiting area of transplant office at OU Med Center.  I was there for a checkup with Dr. Squires.  We had been there long enough for them to finish reading the Ft. Smith and Greenwood newspapers they had brought to keep them entertained during the wait.  Mom was reminding me of things to ask Dr. Squires.

     She added, “And be sure to tell him that Connie wants to donate a kidney,so find out how that works.”  

     What?? 

     “What are you talking about?” I said.  “Who is Connie?”

     Did I hear her right?  Someone wants to give me a kidney? 

     “Didn’t I tell you Connie Grote wants to give you a kidney?” she asked.

     “No!”

     “Oh, I thought I had told you about that,” she said, a little embarrassed at the oversight.

     “Someone wants to give me a kidney?”  I asked incredulously. 

     “Yes, Connie Grote, who cuts my hair, offered to give you one.”

     At that moment, the nurse called my name and I went to have my vital signs checked, which was the first part of a typical appointment at the transplant office.  My throat had suddenly gone dry and I could barely speak to the nurse.  This unexpected announcement had triggered a dozen emotions all at once. 

     Someone wants to give me a kidney!  I can’t believe this.  I don’t even know her.  Mom said her name is Connie something.

     I couldn’t even remember her last name.  I wanted to dart back to the waiting area and ask my mother for more details.  She had just casually dropped this information in my lap and now I had to have my checkup.  While waiting in the examining room, I pressed my thumb and forefinger in the corners of my eyes to stop the tear ducts.  Shock, gratitude, curiosity, desperation, hope, skepticism, worry, relief, exhilaration—those and a dozen other emotions elbowed each other out of the way in a rush to the front of my brain, which had suddenly grown crowded with thoughts and unfamiliar emotions I didn’t have a name for. 

     “I just found out someone wants to give me a kidney,” I told Barbara, the transplant coordinator as she began to go over my medications on my chart.

     “That’s wonderful,” she said.  I can’t remember what else she said, or what all Dr. Squires told me when I shared the news with him.  He explained all the steps necessary for her to be tested to make sure she was a suitable donor for me. 

     After my checkup, my parents and I went to eat lunch in Bricktown, an area of Oklahoma City with several restaurants.  It was our custom, but this time was different.  Over lunch, I told my parents what Dr. Squires had said about the subject of a live donor and got as many details as I could from my mother. 

     Mom said she had talked to Connie about my situation the last few times she had gone for a haircut. 

     “One day, she tapped me on the shoulder and said ‘I’ll give your son a kidney.’  Well, I was flabbergasted.” Mom said.  So, the news had come right out of the blue to her just as it had for me. 

     She went on, “I asked her ‘Connie, what if someone in your own family needs a kidney someday?’  She said ‘God will take care of them.’  So I said ‘Well, OK then.’  Can you believe that?” 

There's more to that chapter, but you have the main part.  It's actually the first part I wrote when I started the book.  It just seemed like the right place to start.  What do you think?

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Author site http://www.jimfairbanks.net/

Why I Talk About It

This coming weekend, I’ll be competing in a speech competition.  I’ve given this particular speech twice already, with some refinement between the first and second time.  The topic: organ donation—from the viewpoint of someone who was lucky enough to receive one.

Actually, I received two.  Maybe I should have titled this post Why I Talk about Them.  But "it" is my personal experience of being a transplant recipient.

One of the main reasons I started writing my memoir was to raise awareness about diabetes, visual impairment, and organ donation in general and pancreas transplants in particular.  Most people still don’t know one can be transplanted.  Some of them are diabetics who could possibly benefit from one.

While reading a book about how to write a non-fiction book proposal for a publisher or agent, I ran across an interesting bit of advice for building a platform—that all-important built-in audience of potential buyers.  It suggested doing speaking engagements.  That made sense.  It went on to suggest joining Toastmasters to improve your speaking skills so you don’t fall flat on your face at those speaking engagements. 

An organization that could teach me how to be a more dynamic speaker?  That sounded like a good idea.  I joined and started getting comfortable talking about myself for a few minutes at a time in front of a room full of people.

It’s a surreal experience, standing up and speaking in front of a bunch of people with normal vision when you can’t see their faces clearly.  They say public speaking is one of the most common fears people have.  I don’t think they polled legally blind ex-diabetic organ recipient cancer survivors.  After all that, it doesn’t frighten me.  Few things do anymore.  But, like so many things I experience, it’s surreal. 

Fast forward a couple of years to last month, when I spoke about what it’s like to go from being diabetic and doing dialysis to suddenly being free from both.  Later, a few people commented that they were going to have the “talk” with their family to let them know they wanted to be a donor if something happened to them.

My first taste of success in this new realm. 

I had given other speeches about interesting or funny things I’ve experienced.  The one about being a legally blind substitute teacher got plenty of laughs.  The objective was vocal variety, which any substitute (or regular) teacher knows something about.

One speech objective was to use my body.  I talked about the day George H.W. Bush flew into our little airport in 1988 to campaign for president.  I worked at Drake Field at the time and ended up being the one to flag in the last plane before he landed—the one that would be parked closest to his.  It had to be just right.  Airport employees were allowed to be closer to where he was than the general public.  We also got to board Air Force II for a quick look while he was out campaigning.

Then I was ready for my speech about organ donation.  The objective was persuasion.  Not surprisingly, it’s a topic I feel very strongly about.  This was my chance to inspire and motivate.  It brought me full circle to when I first started writing my story.

It’s hard to describe the feeling of fulfilling your purpose in life.  It’s sort of a heady, tingly, warm sensation with a sense of powerful intuition—the kind you know in your gut.  It’s being swept up and carried aloft by it without having to struggle.

I already knew my story was meant to be told in writing.  Talking about it and putting some emotion in my words and voice is a different level of intensity.  This rounds out the picture.  It gives a face—a healthy one—to something still shrouded in mystery by most Americans. 

It will be a larger audience this weekend.  Some of them will be competing against me.  I’m going to do my best, but even if I don’t win the contest, I will have won anyway.