Over these past couple of years, I’ve had many wonderful people urge me to take care of myself. On the most part, I thought I did a decent job. I tried to eat healthier-more organics, less red meat-take my vitamins, a probiotic or two, go to the doctor when I didn’t feel well. You know-normal stuff that didn’t put any more stress in my over-stressed life.
Overall, I felt pretty good for a 40 year-old that is 50lbs over-weight. With that in mind, I made plans to return to the gym and drop a few pounds. I went to my Doctor for the infamous middle-age “complete physical”. All the men out there know what I’m talking about. And “no”, my Doctor’s hands weren’t cold.
Unfortunately, my bloodwork showed that my feeble effort just wasn’t enough-I am a diabetic. It really pains me to say it and I’m no where near coming to terms with it.
Even though I have every risk factor there possibly could be-asian, overweight, little to no physical activity, family history-my Doctor said it was likely triggered by all of the stress in my life. My body just can’t handle it.
I thought my life was difficult enough with the kids and Satomi but now I have to seriously take care of myself too? It just keeps getting better.
We were told that we do not qualify for the subsidized COBRA program because her official status at her employer is “Leave of Absense”. I’m going to speak to her HR department and start the appeals process.
If for some reasons Satomi doesn’t return to work as we had originally planned, the almost $1000/month savings would make a huge difference to our life.
The subsidy program ends this year. It’s just another thing that I have to worry about.
It has been several weeks since starting this weeing program overseen by our Endocrinologist. Satomi is now at 2 x 0.5 mg per day. She remains as dizzy as ever.
If all continues at this rate, we hope to be at a zero dose by early December. There is some sign that her other glands are starting to kick back in but we won’t really know until the dose is at 0.25 mg per day.
Keep your fingers crossed!!
Satomi’s medical benefits officially stopped on October 17th. It is now November 3rd and we just had our medical coverage reinstated. While it is true that this 17-day period is well within that specified in the DoL requirements, Satomi’s condition makes it a lifetime. Remember that we have many appointments every week and she takes many medications every day. Medications can’t wait and re-scheduled appointments can mean weeks of delay-All of which are unacceptable.
I needed this conversion to be as quick and easy as possible so I arranged a meeting with Satomi, her boss, and her HR manager. They were very helpful and answered many questions. Basically, I had to wait for the “COBRA package” to arrive in the mail from the COBRA administrator. In it would be all the necessary forms and a fee schedule to facilitate payment. I shouldn’t worry about anything because the coverage is “retroactive”. I don’t do well with “waiting” so I planned to continue an active involvement.
Satomi was running low on certain medications so we ordered them over the phone at our local Walgreens. Satomi called our insurer to verify coverage and supposedly “got us active” so I went to pick them up. “No Insurance-Cash Only” was printed on the packages so I told the Pharmacy people to call the insurer again in the morning. We also called and determined that we were not only inactive but completely removed from the insurers system. I was a bit upset and we started calling everyone to figure out what was the problem. We had enough medication to last until the end of the month.
Several days and many phone calls later, I was told by the COBRA administrator that there was an eligibility date discrepancy on the documents so the entire package was on hold until it could be resolved between our HR and the COBRA administrator management. I explained our situation and emphasized that this could not sit in someone’s In Box.
More days passed and calls made and we were advised to watch our mail. We found nothing so I continued my calls. I spoke with the COBRA administrator at the end of the week and was told that the package was mailed on Tuesday October 27th from their offices in Rhode Island and we needed to immediately fill it out and send it back. I again explained our medication situation. With the representatives help, I was instructed to write a fax containing all pertinent information and provide them a check over the phone in lieu of returning the package. Finally, some progress!
After exchanging 2 separate faxes and speaking with 5 different people, they had the proper information and over $1,300 of my money; but they were in Rhode Island and it was 4:30pm. There wasn’t time to contact our Insurer or get confirmation of the re-activation of our policy. We had no choice but to wait until the following Monday. What the…?
The package arrived on Saturday October 31st.
I spoke with the COBRA people again on that Monday and confirmed that our Insurer was contacted. It had to be processes into their system but should be official by end of business…Tuesday.
Satomi ran out of medication so I had to get a partial prescription filled. It cost me $1,000 for a 2 week supply of medication and I had to pay cash for my Tuesday Dentist appointment-$395. Holy Crap.
Let’s see how the reimbursement process goes.
We recently received a letter from Satomi’s HR department. Her allowed leave under FMLA has just been exhausted. For those of you not familiar with FMLA, take a look here: http://www.dol.gov/whd/fmla/index.htm
There are many changes triggered by the end of FMLA. The most significant is that we no longer qualify for employer paid medical/dental/vision/drug benefits.
We began the process to activate COBRA. Most people know about this but in case you don’t: http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq_consumer_cobra.HTML
Basically we are guaranteed the benefit of identical medical/dental/vision coverage at the discounted rate afforded her employer but the key difference is that we need to pay for entire thing. We were quoted over $1300/month-Holy crap!
Truth be told, I knew it was coming but it’s shocking nonetheless.
Lucky for us, Mr.Obama decided to help us out: http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/COBRA.html
If all goes well, it looks like our COBRA payment will be subsidized and the cost reduced to about $400/month.
I didn’t vote for Mr Obama but in our present situation, I have come to appreciate his work.
Another key change due to the exhaustion of FMLA is that Satomi is no longer guaranteed her original position within her hospital. Her employer now classifies her status as “on personal leave”. The can last until sometime in April of 2010. If she returns to work before then, she is guaranteed a job but the specific position is to be determined. A bit upsetting after all of her years but we just can’t worry about it.
Hopefully, she won’t take that long to recover. We remain optimistic.
Satomi's Cancer Blog 