Destroyed by Lack of Insurance

Posted on August 17, 2009 in Bipolar Disorder Insurance

*REVISED* 8/23/2009

Twenty years ago, a young man was in serious difficulties. Waves of depression paralyzed him at a terrible job in a declining small business. He had difficulty sleeping at night. He had unexplainable chest pains and dizzy spells. When he went to the trailer in a warehouse that served as the personnel office, he learned that his insurance covered next to nothing. Mental health was a joke and therefore an unnecessary expense, so he could not get help for the anxiety that drove his life into goo. The mood disorder distorted his perspective: he did not believe he could find a job elsewhere.

The decade before his employment with the tiny plastic injection molding company, he had gone from job to job, never finding a place where he had health insurance. He did work, but mostly in temporary and part time jobs which didn’t offer an insurance package ((It is often said that the people who lack health insurance in this country are lazy. It’s the opposite — they often hold down more than one job to pay the bills, working hours that squeeze their hearts with stress and wear down their brains)) . His bizarre behavior sometimes cost him positions. He held on to the lousy job because, driven by his undiagnosed conditions, he believed that he could not reach for sanity. There was no money for it.

When the company finally folded after an unionization attempt, he was a nervous wreck. Using his wife’s insurance after she received a raise, he finally sought help and was diagnosed with major depression. Prozac was still not enough. He got into frequent fights on the Net, sometimes waking his wife up at impossible hours to watch them. Using his credit card, he pushed his family $40,000 in the red ((Excessive spending is a hallmark of mania)) . Video and online games were his self-medication ((I don’t believe video games make you crazy. I think they are a magnet, however, for people limping along with obsessions.)) .

Ten years later, doctors discovered a congenital heart condition and eleven years later, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. He held no job during this time.

I believe that the life of this young man — who was me — would have been different if he had had insurance. I know that if I could have afforded reasonable care during my twenties, I would not be a house-husband today. I could have worked. I could have taken out loans and gone back to school. But my mind was a swamp and I panicked at every thought.

The current plan proposed by a Blue Dog-Republican coalition will not guarantee insurance to all nor bring down insurance premiums. How many other lives will be wrecked by lack of insurance? Give it to them.