Showing posts with label insurance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label insurance. Show all posts

Saturday, December 22, 2007

Seth Day.......Revisited

We're All About Exercise


Play Time





Bonding With Grandpa
I may have mentioned it before, but Friday of each week is Seth Day for us. It is one of those special times when we get to spend quality time with the youngest of the grandchildren. That smile on Seth's face is there pretty much all of the time. Occasionally you may catch him without it, but usually that is when something has really captured his attention and he is pondering the great secrets of that object.
I look for him to be pulling up to and walking around things before too much longer. His legs are very muscular and when he is in his exersaucer he is not only standing on his own, but jumping as well. He just needs to get the balancing act down a little better.
I can't think of a day better spent, than one spent with the grandchildren. I just wish that all of our little ones were close enough that we could just hop into the car and go see them every day. The 18 hour drive and the price of gas sort of limits us on that.
While spending time with Seth yesterday I received a follow up call on something I had inquired about last week. I had seen an advertisement for a company that provides testing supplies for diabetics. They were offering information packets, coupons for diabetic supplies, and a diabetic recipe book. I went online and requested the packet leaving my information so they could contact me. It wasn't the company that you see advertising all of the time on TV, but one that I was not familiar with. I am here to tell you that contacting these people was the smartest move I have made in a long long time. The pills that I take for my diabetes are the only medication that I can get in generic form as a $4.00 prescription at a local pharmacy. Everything else; Byeta, Lantus, even my test strips have to be sent off to the Prescription Insurance Company to be filled at $50.00 a pop. That is until the first of the year, when the cost of our insurance is going up, as well as the cost of having the Rx filled, which will be $65.00 then (and the lancets are not covered at all). My Endocrinologist wants me to test four times each day. Well it just doesn't happen. Living on a fixed income makes a person stop and think, how can I deal with this without going bankrupt paying for Rx refills. The lady that I talked to yesterday (Vickie) asked about my testing. I told her that I don't test four times a day because of the expense and that I also use an old meter that I had because the test strips were $50.00 as opposed to $65.00 for the newer meter that I have. Instead, I test when I feel funky. I know that doing this does not help keep the diabetes under control, but you do what you have to do. She took some information about our Rx insurance carrier and our health care insurance carrier and said she was going to do some checking to see if she couldn't get those testing supplies for me at a cheaper price. In less than 30 minutes Vickie was calling me back with 'Merry Christmas' greetings and saying that our insurance company is going to take care of those testing supplies through Vickie's company at the cost of $4.95 for a three months supply of test strips. But Wait!!! That's Not All!!!
They will also cover the cost of my lancets! ..............But Wait!!! That's Not All!!! Vickie is going to send me a new meter at no cost to me that will give me more accurate readings than the old one more than likely has. I thought I had saved the information for this web site on the computer, but I can't locate it. When I receive my care package from Vickie, I will be sure to post the information for anyone else that may need this type of assistance. Testing supplies at $4.95 ~vs~ $65.00 is a no brainer for me.
Jo's note: Yes, Virginia there is a Santa Claus! (Sometimes he calls himself Vickie though)

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

While I Was Sleeping





We had a visitor yesterday evening here on the mountain. It was a young man that I had invited to come by and tell us what he had to offer in the way of a cancer insurance policy. We had one that we have been paying on since 2002, but the premiums had jumped from $53 a month to $136 in five years. That price hike didn't reflect any claims from us, because there were none. How ever being a survivor myself of cervical cancer and memories of my mothers death from cancer still pretty fresh in my mind, I truly feel the need for a cancer policy.

Our young insurance representative assured us that he would not sell us anything that we did not need and commented that a person can be insurance poor. If that isn't an understatement, I really don't know what is. That very thought has been rolling around in my mind for quite some time now. It started in October when we received notice from our insurance company in Louisiana that they could no longer write the type of policy that JD had for the house that he co-owns with my ex-wife-in-law. As a result they would have to write a different sort of policy that was going to end up costing us a little over 3 times as much as what we were already paying.

"COME ON PEOPLE...... WE ARE RETIRED HERE AND TRYING TO LIVE ON A FIXED INCOME!"

I went to work on that one right away and found that the wonderful people at The Hartford (through AARP) were more than happy to take care of our insurance woes not only at an acceptable premium, but offering more bang for the buck. It was at this point when I had them run quotes for our little home on the mountain, as well as for our vehicles. Again they were able to offer us more benefits for less money on everything. Right about now, I would be thumbing my nose at Allstate.

Okey Dokey, I need to get back on track with this story. I started thinking about how insurance has taken over our lives, not to mention our incomes. We no longer have just life insurance, stay with me here because I am going to start a list of the many kinds of insurances that I can think of and there will probably be many that I don't think of:


  • Life

  • Burial

  • Dental

  • Eye

  • Health

  • Prescription

  • Cancer

  • Stroke

  • Heart Attack

  • Home Owners

  • Renters

  • Accident

  • Automobile

  • Malpractice

  • Valuable processions

  • Don't forget those valuable body parts (Hands and Legs)

They even have Pet Health Insurance and Pet Accident Insurance now to take care of Fido and Fluffy's needs!


When did this happen? I remember when I was small, my mother taking me to the Dr. and before we left she would open her purse and take out a few dollars and pay for the office call. We seldom went to the drug store because the Dr. usually dispensed his own medication. At what point in time did it become necessary to have insurance to pay for the Dr. and medications that he or she prescribes? One thing is certain, without the insurance, the days of opening your purse and paying a few dollars for the office call and medication is a thing of the past. Even with the insurance coverage it is getting more and more difficult to afford health care. The cost of the premiums are increasing on an annual basis, while the benefits are decreasing. I for one, see something seriously wrong with this picture.


I ask again when did this happen? As I sit here drinking my morning coffee I will continue to ponder that question and see if I can come up with the answer. For right now though I would just have to say it must have happened while I was sleeping!


Mental note to Jo: Sleep with one eye open in the future.