i turned thirty this month. i like it. i have a love hate relationship with my twenties. this birthday is also the best birthday i have ever had. even better than my six year old celebration at skateland. (oh wait. maybe not best. my sixteenth i got my 74 vw bug. that will probably never be topped).
i also completed my first six months at my new job. i am now eligible for company benefits including health care. i have dreamt of employer coverage ever since i dropped out of college and lost my student insurance. i couldn't get back on my parent's plans (i was twenty years old--a problem that would now be moot because the age has been extended by the new federal health care law to twenty six.)
however there are two ironies to this situation.
1.) is that i am now covered (effective november first) by kaiser permanente, one of the largest (if not the most?) medical groups on the west coast. when dan and i moved to portland in 2004 and discovered his employer's insurance did not cover spouses or other dependants, i independently applied to kaiser for coverage. i was denied because i had chronic depression and fibromyalgia, which they errantly defined as related to multiple sclerosis. now here i am in 2010, one of 8.6 million kaiser permanente members, just because i work full time for an employer with a company plan. so this is quite bittersweet.
2.) kaiser requires members to remain in their system for all services including hospitals, pharmacies, and practitioners. i had to leave my general practitioner, psychiatrist, physical therapist, and gynecologist to see kaiser doctors. i gained coverage at the expense of losing the doctors with whom i have built trusting relationships with over the past four years. needless to say, i totally cried when i said goodbye to my gyno who diagnosed me with pcos and has been helping us try to conceive, and the psychiatrist who saw me through several medication adjustments and a very rough patch of depression in 08-09, as well as referred me to portland dialectal therapy which played an integral role in my recovery. again, bittersweet.
of course, i have every right to not accept coverage and keep my membership with omip. but my co-pays and deductible are small and my employer generously pays 100% of my montly premium. it would be ludicrous to keep paying $350 a month + higher co-pays just to keep my doctors.
i am crossing my fingers that i will find good doctors and the adjustment into a new system will be as stress-free as possible.
i saw my general care doctor at the last possible second, on thursday, for a sore throat. the past two days i have been on the couch with cough drops watching a generous amount of tv. we figured out a great compromise until our tv system is better: an hdmi cable to plug our laptop directly into the tv to use hulu. i was so happy i watched anything i could. anything. general hospital, grey's anatomy, fringe, better with you, modern family, house, saturday night live, cougar town, community, parenthood. and i swear i believed that i would never watch this show, but i did: i got gleeed.
because i am sick i missed the sufjan stevens concert last night. i couldn't find a replacement so dan ended up selling our tickets to a very grateful couple outside the venue. sufjan is the kind of musician that i have on my list of "must see live." so i'm totally bummed. he was also part of our 2010 AMAZING concert line-up, which included band of horses, arcade fire (one of the best shows i have ever been to) and two shows in november: black keys/sleigh bells and over the rhine (my eleventh otr show! woot!)
in summary: please answer one or all of the following questions:
what was your favorite birthday? do you like your health insurance company? do you watch glee? did your respect for me diminish slightly when you discovered that i watch general hospital? who is on your "must see live" musician list?
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