Come and listen to a story

Come and listen to a story bout a girl named Red

Poor mountain woman, barely kept her family fed

And then one day her bosses said she had the flu

Without health insurance, this could happen to you.

 

Or your family and loved ones.

Dead today and gone the morrow.

 

I knew I was sick.  I could barely breathe and it started all of the sudden like.  I knew I worked in a building filled with toxic mold - a doctor's office, even - but damn, I really needed that job!  That job paid me a salary, but not a single pittance more.  No health insurance, no paid vacation, no paid sick leave, no paid holidays, no pension plan - paid by the minute.  I know - I was in charge of keeping track of those minutes for everyone. 

 

At first, I was told I had the flu, which would pass and so get back to work.  After 3 or 4 days of registering in at 102 degrees and having passed out on my kitchen floor, breaking the cat's water dish with my head, I again sought the opinion of my bosses.  Well, it just might be bronchitis, so take a penicillin shot and get back to work. 

 

My old man didn't believe I was sick because, well, you see, I'm an exaggerating hypochondriac.  He had insurance through his work, but we couldn't afford it for me or the rest of us.  At least not the insurance he chose. 

 

I took off a couple of days without pay because my fever wouldn't go away and I was starting to hallucinate really ugly stuff.  I'd passed out on the kitchen floor again, but didn't break anything that time.  I was coughin and hackin and dizzy and exhausted and as per usual, it was all in my head. 

 

After 2 1/2 weeks, I asked my son to drop me off at the hospital ER.  I waited until after the old man had gone to work, because I knew all too well of his objections.  And, for land's sake, I worked for doctors!

 

They took me in right away.  They started an IV in an artery.  I asked the ER doctor if it was gonna hurt very much more than a regular IV and he said, "Honey, you won't be feeling a thing.  You're in shock."  During the course of our light banter, he informed me that if I hadn't chosen to come to the ER that day, I would have been spending the next day in the morgue.  I had double pneumonia and sepsis. 

 

Sepsis is something that happens to ya when you have a major infection that goes untreated for a good long spell.  The infection gets into your blood and does damage wherever it can.  When I arrived at the ER, I had a blood pressure of 60/40, meaning several of my much needed body parts were starting to close down operations for the duration.

 

Well, needless to say, I lived, but that sepsis has a way of making sure you know better the next time around.  One of those necessary body parts that ol' sepsis decided to attack was my heart.  In particular, the systolic function of my left ventricle, which means that blood pumps into my heart just fine, but it don't much want to pump out.  In doctor terms, I have congestive heart failure.  I can't take the usual medications for it because my normal blood pressure is very low, and those particular meds lower it more. 

 

Because my heart ain't quite workin right, I feel mighty tired most all the time.  As a result of the sepsis, I have pernicious anemia, which means that it's here to stay, and that makes me feel tired, also.  My hair's startin to grow back in pretty good now.  For some reason, I lost about 3/4 of it - don't rightly know why. 

 

____________________________________

 

So, for those of you who are against all forms of Nationalized Health Care - who think that all of us uninsured folks are a bunch of unemployed deadbeats living off the dole - or who are so delusional as to thing that employers actually provide health care for their employees in this day and age, especially in a "right to work" state - well, I hope y'all never get sick.  As for me, I'm gonna drag my bones to bed now.