Pluto In Capricorn And The Expanding Black Market: Sick Children
Vivian and I have things in common. We both hate to sit still and we notice this about each other. We both tell stories, we both like men and most notably we both have sick children.
Vivian’s daughter has severe, life threatening asthma that has been pretty well controlled over the last year but this little girl was living at the emergency room 18 months ago and my daughter was doing same. We’ve noticed our lives go in tandem to an extent and when I looked in Vivian’s eyes as she talked about this I could see the terror and pain I knew so well. I am sure she saw the same in mine and we are deeply bonded because of this.
Our daughters have been in the same room on what at the time we would have called, “a good day” when good days were rare and precious. You just don’t know if you kid is going to survive or what. Vivian and I would look at each other, look at them.. look at each other and just shake our heads.
You don’t know why the thing is happening. You’re doing everything you can. In fact your life is consumed trying to keep your child above ground and no other mothers know what the hell you’re talking about unless of course they do. I did and she did.
One of the things that happens when your kid is sick is you go broke and no talks about this. The focus is on the child but really it’s the whole family involved. I don’t care if you have insurance. I had insurance and so did Vivian but every time you have to take to your kid to the emergency room you still get a $1000 bill and that is after the insurance has paid. When your kid goes to the hospital 3 times a week… well pretty soon all the resources you can come up with go to pay these bills.
In my case I incurred $30,000 in debt when my daughter was in the hospital for 28 days in a 2 month period so I am telling you, this is no joke. At that pace you’re looking up at wracking up $200,000 in debt in a year and you’ve still got your routine bills… your rent or your house payment, food, school clothes to buy, never mind some kind of comfort or distraction for the sick child and if possible the siblings?
You’ve got to do this while you don’t work by the way because how are you going to work when your kid is not only too sick to attend school but in total crisis?
You, yourself go without anything for obvious reasons and it was via conversations about these type things I learned how strapped Vivian’s family was.
She never complained, that would not be her style. She just used to remark from time to time that she and her husband had barely been able to scrape the money together to pay their bills that month and it’s very strange. You find yourself praying your kid gets better not just because you want your kid better but also because you can’t afford them to not get better.
You look around at other families and they are not having this struggle. I mean, let’s face it. Most kids are healthy so those of us who have had this other experience… well it just takes you places most know nothing about. It sounds like this:
“If she has to go back to the hospital, I have no idea how to pay for it so I am just hoping this new medicine works…”
That could be either one of us talking and then we’d look at each other and both cross our fingers. You know. There would be four hands in the air with fingers crossed tightly and we’d just smile at each other stupidly due our similar faith-filled personalities and hearts full of hope.
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33 Responses to “Pluto In Capricorn And The Expanding Black Market: Sick Children”
Single-payer health care like the rest of the civilized world anyone?
But wholly apart from that issue, I’m always very appreciative when you write about your daughter. It’s a level of openness and generosity with your writing that none of us blog readers are owed. It’s a gift, and it always gives me a moment of pause in which I am thankful for my own daughter.
Nothing fucking pisses me off more about the so called “health-care” system in this country than that it’s always all about the goddamn money.
Elsa, I do not have a chronically ill chill, so I do not pretend to understand fully that kind of stress, but I do have a child in the autistic-spectrum. We need to see all kinds of therapists, and throughout the years, you name the specialist, we have been there. And it was always about justifying why she needed this or that, and now our insurance company, which used to be one of the better ones, is no longer covering the medication she is taking. Fortunately, this particular medication, we can still afford it, but damn these fuckers, always putting a price on all of us.
Thank you for sharing this - I can sense it is highly personal, and I look forward to hearing the rest.
I can hardly imagine what it’s like for parents, so reading this, seeing how it is from their perspective, moves me deeply. I was a sick child seeing an ENT specialist pretty much regularly, and almost lost my hearing at one point. I know what it’s like to have to run up to the ER late at night and stay there until 5 in the morning.
More recently, I remember having a severe allergic reaction to something I ate. It was the second time I’d had to deal with a scare like that, and it was some completely different food so I still don’t know what the culprit was. There I was, scared out of my mind, pacing the floor with throbbing cramps, a weird itchy rash on my back and a tightened throat that made it difficult to breathe. But before they even assessed me, they forced me to sign all this paperwork! It’s funny now, but back then it was such a huge jolt to me. I’d just barely turned “of age” and was completely enraged at the situation. “Welcome to the adult world,” right… 
I think it’s immoral wrong the way America makes its citazens pay (so Much!!) for health care.
Completely, utterly Wrong.
yes, it is so wrong! it makes me soo mad i could spit!! universal health care does work- and the us system needs a huge adjustment! my 89 year old grandmother came to visit me here in italy this summer and she cut her wrist totally open in a bar- she was shocked at the 29 euro bill for the surgery… i work and the government takes out the money so we can have treatment…
thank-you elsa for sharing your so very personal experiences. your strength is inspirational.
This is why I remain ever so grateful for the NHS (National Health Service) and the fact that in Britain this stuff (especially emergency treatment) is free to anyone.
In awful circumstances it is one thing less to worry about.
It isn’t free. It is at a great cost to tax payers, even those who do not use it, that is why it is socialist therefore against the principals of which America was founded on.
I do not wish to pay for gastric bypass sx, diabetes, lung cancer, cirrhosis of the liver, etc. for those who would never have the illness had they not indulged so heavily in a glutonous and sedentary lifestyle.
Isn’t it cold hearted to make others pay for your sins (so to speak)? And don’t think I am condemning because I have probably done worse than you, but I do not expect a hand out for it. I do believe in programs that lend aid but America is not a socialist country!
I weep for the future of what is now a fading Republic.
I would love to know what sins sick children have committed? Children with cancer, leukemia, hodgkins disease, lupus, sickle-cell anemia, autism, down’s syndrome, neurological disorders, and any other serious illness/disorder they have been plagued with? Why don’t you have a sit-down with the parents, give your estimate of what their child’s life is worth?
Really, this sounds like every conversation that I have had with an insurance company’s “customer service” representative. My tears, my weeping, is for people - children - the innocent. Not the greedy “Republic”.
elsa, i lost a comment somewhere in internet land… don’t see it?…thanx, aml
Thank you Dorothy.
my son had severe early childhood asthma and i know about those days and nights rushing to ER and staying there…my heart goes out to you and your daughter….keep the faith and we’ll all yell out a collective WAR CRY to change the system… mars in cancer here….seriously, things need to change, pray they will.
Yes SkyPie, while I enjoy my nine months of paid maternity leave and 5 weeks of paid holiday leave per year, plus up to 6 months of paid sick leave should the misfortune strike, you bet I’m thinking about all the ways in which Socialism has screwed me over.
BTW, what I pay in tax from my salary is fairly equivalent to what Americans tend to pay for their insurance.
I’ve always taken the measure of a state by how well it looks after the least of its members, but that’s just me and my suspect liberal principles.
I wish no one to experience what Elsa has been through, but I especially don’t wish them to be burdened additionally at that time by thinking about if they are going to end up homeless and broke for the crime of having a sick child they do their best to keep alive.
Or you could be a parent in Malawi where the cost of transportation to the doctor is prohibitive in and of itself. Or Zimbabwe were the hospitals have closed and the doctors and nurses are fleeing the country as fast as they can. You could be a parent there with a sick child.
I cannot imagine the pain of any parent anywhere with a sick child where they are not in control or able to care for their child they way they wish. It makes me sad. So very sad.
Thank you for sharing Elsa - once again your honesty teaches us so much of the personal aspect that is not spoken of mostly anywhere.
‘what I pay in tax from my salary is fairly equivalent to what Americans tend to pay for their insurance’
Nina I have never thought of it like that before and thank you for pointing it out as you make a very succinct and valuable point.
Making assumptions is argumentative not productive to problem solving.
What happened to the healing physician who made house calls and stayed up all night with a sick child in exchange for a chicken and warm bowl of soup?
Today’s doctors shove their drug/blood money into their pockets and drive off in their new Porsche and this just after telling a grieving family their child will die if they can’t come up with the cash they required to treat them.
Do you really believe it is normal for so many children to not be able to breathe on their own?
Do you really think we need to find a cure for cancer? Or do you think we should stop giving it to people in the first place?
SkyPie, where we are now so clearly does not work. It’s a huge turning point. I have no answers, but sometimes I wonder if the warcry over our “descent into socialism” isn’t in itself argumentative. Our republic is changing whether we want it to or not.. what’s the best way forward? I don’t know.
“I would love to know what sins sick children have committed?”
Me, too. Did someone say they did?
If you keep cost down people would be able to keep their dignity by paying for their own medical care.
It is supply and demand with the drug companies at the top. They along with physicians convince the public they routinely need them to survive.
It is alarming how many vaccinations are required of children today. It is alarming how many school aged children are being drugged into submission. It is alarming how many women are having their babies cut out of them. Pregnancy is treated as an illness. An illness!
Do you want the right to refuse medical care for yourself or your own children? Or would you prefer to be taken into court where your fitness as a parent is challenged?
I am having a problem getting my replies to post so please bear with me, I know it seems I jump around as I often do not actually say everything ‘out loud.’
Keep health care cost down by striking down the idea that it is needed so much in the first place. Supply and demand keeps it high with drug companies at the top by convinceing you you need them and paying off physicians.
Do you want to retain the right to refuse medical care? Or do you want to be taken to court where your fitness as a parent is questioned? Do you really believe: It is normal that so many children can’t breathe on their own? It is normal for school children to be drugged into submission? For pregnant women to have their babies cut out of them? For pregnancy to be treated as an illness? - An illness!
^ Well that’s a mess. Sorry, they did not show up at the time I posted them.
“sometimes I wonder if the warcry over our “descent into socialism” isn’t in itself argumentative. Our republic is changing whether we want it to or not.. what’s the best way forward? I don’t know.”
Maureen I can only assume you are serious in what you said. I, too, am being serious when I ask the following questions.
Do you understand the fundamentals of the U.S. Constitution?
Do you believe one should lay down their weapons and allow liberty to be trampled upon or become informed and fight as our forefathers fought for us?
Interesting to compare different Health Care systems of various countries, as Nina has mentioned the British system. Australia has inherited much of British ways (as we were once a British colony, some say we still are!)
Our health system takes a nominal amount from every salary cheque, $5-$10 bucks a week, automatically, that provides access to some free National health care. The unemployed, disabled, homeless get the same basic care. Socialism can work, when everyone is provided with the same access (sounds Aquarian?). The rugged individualism of Capitalism is over-rated.
Individuals can take private health insurance for the extras, but that’s optional and expensive for low-income earners.
I’m all Saturn/Uranus on this. I’m very much small government/keep gov’t out of my healthcare but I know how financially devastating illness can be (going through that right now).
I know people with the same illness that I have, who live in places with socialized healthcare. They have less access to specialists, longer wait times, and if they pay for private treatment in addition to the socialized healthcare they get a better level of care.
So I think it is a tradeoff.
Personally, I think that giving the federal gov’t that much power is not a very good idea. Plus I can’t think of anything they do well. Except the military. And collecting income tax.
Plus I don’t think it is fair to make everyone pay for it, without a choice. But I don’t think an income tax is fair, even. So what do I know.
^ I hear you Jilly.
Australia I see this is your opinion. “The rugged individualism of Capitalism is over-rated.” However it matters not who agrees with it, myself included and I am a U.S. citizen.
If you watched the recently televised inauguration of the current U.S. president you saw him raise his hand and swear to defend the U.S. Constitution.
That was a lie.
^ Is that to convey a message of just tolerate it??
You can lay down or you can do something about it.
Skypie, not at all. We’re all trying to do something about it. Just trying to point out, there is opinion, and there is fact. How do we work together? You think Obama is a liar - I won’t take that away from you. Lots of Saturn/Uranus at play here. I feel it, do you?
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thanks for posting this elsa. there is a lot to learn from what you write, especially about compassion for other people. and this vivian sounds like gold on legs to me:)