Spring Sprung…and Summer Has Come…
Spring Sprung…and Summer Has Come…
By Beverly Hicks Burch
June 24,2008
Posted by Bamasteelmagnolia

Well, it happened…spring sprung and left us. The unrelenting heat of summer is bearing down upon us. This is my least favorite time of the year. I know there are those of you who thrive on the heat…God bless your souls…but, I am not one.

We’ve already had 100+° days here before spring ended…a little early in my opinion. It makes me wonder what is ahead for the summer. We are a little dry, but my folks in Alabama have had rain.

May was an unusually hard and busy time for me…and June has turned out to be that way also. It’s been full of doctors and lawyers and research and trying to stay well…or at least not hurt beyond the insanity point. That means new meds.

I learned at my last doctor’s visit I can add bursitis to my library of aliments…this one’s in my hip. It has been chronically there for about a year to 18 months. The exam and the two horse injections I received in that joint almost resulted in my doc getting his sheetrock removed from the wall…gratis…with my fingernails.

I also have some kind of funky inflammation in the cartilage between my breastbone and ribs. I could get injections in that area, but Doc doesn’t recommend that because it’s so close to the heart and lungs. Oh, joy…ok, pain vs…punctured heart or lung…humm, let me do the math for a minute…

I’m still involved in the disability debacle. Needless to say I do not have a high opinion of disability insurance carriers at the moment. In the waiting room at the doctors office most of “us” patients entered into a very interesting exchange about the very subject. It’s a terrible injustice these companies perpetrate upon people they make promises to after taking their money in the form of premiums for years.

One gal in the waiting room was in a car accident that nearly took her life; she has MS, fibromyalgia and many other chronic and disabling health problems. She had worked for the phone company for 20 years and made over $60,000 a year. When she became sick, she was on disability for a short time, then her benefits were terminated because she was told as long as she had a voice and could speak she could work! When she said ok, give me a job, she was told, we have nothing for you.

You should know one thing…if you are an employee and you are purchasing LTD…long term disability insurance…you are purchasing thin ice…air almost. The way the law (known as ERISA) is written now it written more for the benefit of big insurance companies and not for the people who need it the most…the disabled…you…the person who purchased the policy on the first place. The public is very uneducated concerning this topic…until the ugly veil of reality hits them in the face.

Congress wrote the ERISA laws…and they are the ones that can changes the laws, but it will only happen if and when the public becomes concerned enough. Right now, all lawmakers and legislators are concerned about are how many handicapped parking spaces are in front of Wal-Mart…or wherever…because it makes them look concerned. In reality, it’s just a good sound bite and PR for them. They need to do more to protect the rights of the truly disabled to protect them from big nefarious insurances carriers. The public needs to start holding lawmakers accountable on the subject.

More on this subject later…

Good news…the house is beginning to look “normal”. The office looks like an office…that’s “wife” speak meaning T & H’s desk is umm, organized in his way…kinda like my dad’s way…like Daddy’s admin called Mom and told her one time…his desk looks like a garage sell. Around here that means the “planets” are lining up right again *grin*. The quilt room is a work in progress, and the living room…well, there are still two big ol’ desk in there that have to be addressed, but, hey, people, there is progress!

So, onward summer…

© 2008 Beverly Hicks Burch All Rights Reserved.
Comments: 0
Votes:24