I am sad and angry. I'm not fun to talk to me right now and basically, I am licking my wounds. People hurt my feelings a lot this past week. My fear about my ability to pay for child's healthcare has fallen on a lot of deaf ears. I want to share little about how I am feeling. A little bit about why the result of this election is so terrifying for me.
Imagine being told your child's body was slowly going to break down until he lost the use of every muscle in his body. That eventually he wouldn't be able to breathe on his own and his heart would stop beating likely before he was 25 or 30. Imagine there is absolutely no cure, no treatment, nothing you can do to stop it. Your child's life will be a slow agonizing march to death.
Imagine then that someone found medicine to slow everything down, to give a few more years, a few more good years. Years he can play his Xbox and hug you. Years he can breathe without machines. Then imagine that it cost $300,000.00 a year. You need to pay 10% or $30,000.00 a year. You make after taxes maybe double, maybe triple that but you have to pay all your living expenses too. Imagine you have to say no to that medicine because you simply can't afford it. Imagine not being able to provide your child life into his late 20's. That is what repealing Obamacare is asking of Shelby and me, this is our greatest fear.
Before Obamacare insurance capped our yearly out of pocket but that didn't include prescriptions. Now prescriptions are included in this cap. I believe our family max is $2000.00 which is a lot less than $30,000.00 Tell be how the hell should I feel okay about repealing Obamacare? How am I supposed to not feel betrayed by the people that voted for the guy that wants to repeal it and then try to replace it. He says with something better.
What is something better? Everyone keeps telling us to wait and see. Seriously? This is our child. His illness isn't going to wait. It's not going away while we argue whether healthcare is a right or a privilege. Then what? Hope it gets replaced with something that includes all the same language that was already a law?
Am I being annoying and angry? Hell yes, I am. All I hear all the time is ,be angrier Nicole. Advocate. This is me advocating. This election was a lot of people ignoring that.
I accept the results of this countries election. I will not, however, stop talking about this. It is important. We have to decide what kind of country are we going to be from here? What messages are we going to send to our children about inclusion and taking care of those less fortunate than ourselves?
