Obama Care is Unacceptable! And I'm Uninsured!

This whole health care debate is absolutely exhausting and it's caused some major tension in our house. Apparently some people are so desperate to believe the President that they'll accept any claim that he makes about abortion not being part of the health care bill. Or they wish that that particular issue would just disappear (I too wish it would disappear, but I wish it would disappear because it was outlawed, not because everyone decided to give up and ignore the slaughter of unborn children...). I also find the double standard about respecting the office of President to be amusing/disturbing. The same people that are now whining that conservatives need to be more respectful were calling George W an idiot on a daily basis from 2000-2008. How's that for respecting the office? Or do only liberal presidents deserve respectful treatment?

On facebook a number of friends have posted on this is issue on a daily basis. Many of the posts are quite rude. One (written by an elementary school teacher I had) said that people who are against this plan are all greedy selfish people with coverage. I'd like to address this idea.

I don't have health insurance and I haven't for over a year. I can't buy insurance if it doesn't come with a job (my husband's since I'm a SAHM) even if we had the money to buy it. Here's my last experience with trying to buy insurance and why it just won't happen:

I was covered by Blue Shield of California, through my parents, when I was in college. I was getting ready for another season of rugby after returning from South Africa and I was training hard. I was on the field and in the gym an average of seven hours a day. I'd had some back spasms before I left for Africa after a person I knew grabbed on to my hair and yanked it hard, jarring my back (and a troubling incident after that when I was doing sprints and my legs simply stopped working). I went to my schools health center and they repeatedly assured me that I'd just pulled a muscle and that it wasn't serious.

One day after practice my best friend and I drove to the beach in Pacifica to surf. While we were out I fell down the face of a wave and hit my board with my chest. The timing couldn't have been worse. The wave hit me as it closed and my body bent in two backwards with my feet ending up next to my head. I made it in to the beach and laid down. When my friend found me and helped me out of my wet suite there was a bruise down my spine and my back was swollen. I went back to the health center. They gave me muscle relaxers and said it was just a pulled muscle again. I asked if I should be able to play rugby. They said it should be fine in a few days and I went on my way.

After months of pain that ranged from back spasms to pain shooting down my legs (and several trips to the health center where they acted like I was insane and told me that I was fine) I found a orthopedic spinal specialist. We talked for about five minutes and he was very concerned. The MRI he ordered showed the problem L5-S1 was "desiccated." He could never see if it had completely ruptured because the herniation went straight into my spine, instead of to one side or the other. After 4 epidurals and months of physical therapy I had lost thirty pounds of muscle (was weighing in at 103 lbs at 5'5") and was in constant pain. The surgeon that worked with my doctor thought that he could fix it. It was a new surgery, but as a specialist he had had success with it and it was much less risky then fussing my spine.

Blue Shield refused the request for the surgery because the technique was experimental.

And then I lost my insurance because I had graduated.

After a couple of painful years I applied for insurance with Blue Shield. It took them several months to talk to all of my former doctors. They came back and said the could not cover me because I had an uncorrected herniation of L5-S1. It didn't matter that it was uncorrected because they had refused (multiple times) my doctor's requests for the surgery. It disqualified me from getting insurance.

My back finally healed on its own and I am pain free 99% of the time. But I am also uninsurable. I absolutely believe reform is needed. However that reform cannot include abortion coverage!

If I were thinking selfishly I'd absolutely say I supported Obama's health plan. I might actually get some sort of coverage (and believe me anything would be better then nothing). It's unnerving being uninsured.

It isn't selfishness or greed that keeps me from supporting our President's plan and I do believe reform is needed. But any plan that involves abortion is unacceptable. The selfish idea is the idea that a woman's right to do whatever she wants with her body is greater then her unborn child's right to life.

Yes the system needs major changes. Unfortunately this plan is unacceptable as it is. It isn't the change that I can believe in.