I remember the first time that my mother complained of having a strange pain in her side. She thought that it was one of her organs but did not know for sure what it was or what it meant. This scared me but despite my begging, she never went to see the doctor. Four months later she still mentioned it from time to time but had just learned to live with it. That was a big part of growing up for me: learning to live with it. This meant never asking to see the dentist when my teeth hurt and living with untreated aches, pains, allergies and sickness.
My parents are not afraid of doctors, they just do not have health insurance. My father is a commercial fisherman and is self-employed. This means that he has to pay full price for health care for my family, a family of seven. When fishing is not doing well, and it can go from boom to bust in a flash, money gets really tight. Health care, being very expensive, is the last thing my parents can afford, and they are the first to go without it. The only times I have ever known of my father receiving health care treatment was when he was being treated for cancer when I was two. And once when he needed stitches. Those were the only times.
Growing up without health insurance has greatly impacted my life also. Going to the dentist meant going without something else. Because my family could not afford it, it was not until I was sixteen years old that I finally was able to see an allergy doctor about the allergies that had plagued me my whole life. He told me that I was allergic to mold, trees, and grass, and that my year-round runny nose, eczema, and headaches were caused by my untreated allergies. He also explained to me that my asthma, which I had ignored and thought was just a mild case, was actually serious to the point that I was already beginning to suffer from not treating it. That one appointment alone cost $500 dollars. I remember standing next to my mother as she asked the secretary if she could be billed, thinking that if the appointment cost this much, how much would the actual medicine (which I had been prescribed a lot of) cost. Over the next few days I tried to convince my parents that I was fine and did not need any medicine because it was so expensive. I told them that I could live without it; I had been for years. But they wouldn’t hear of it and bought me the medicine. For the fist time in as long as I could remember I could breathe easily and I felt awake and healthy. When the medicine ran out I had to wait until my parents could afford to buy it again. Going on and off my medicine was exactly what my doctor had told me I should not do. But when you have to pay full price for your medicine making adjustments and compromises to the doctors orders is just what you have to do.
My father is in his forties and has been working manual labor on commercial fishing boats for over twenty years. When I think about the condition his health is in, it terrifies me. His teeth and gums are rotting, some of his teeth are missing. He has not been to a dentist since he was a teenager. Like my mom, he ignores the pains in his body. The more he ages, the more alarming this becomes. Besides his teeth, the skin on his nose and ears has marks and scars that remind me of pictures of skin disorders and melanoma that I see in science class. His hands are stiff with carpal tunnel from baiting fish lines and fixing nets and the extreme weather conditions have deteriorated his body. It is noticeable and it scares me. To think of what will happen to my parents in the future from receiving almost no health care their entire adult lives is terrifying. They both have no opportunities for obtaining for getting health insurance in the near future and no retirement fund or pension to look forward to.
It is hard to believe that in an advanced and prosperous nation, millions of hardworking people who have jobs and do all they can for their families have to go without basic health care because they cannot afford it. And children who have no control over their economic status have to as well. People who do have health insurance take for granted the extremely low price they pay for health care, the same health care people without health insurance have to learn to live without.
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Not only is health insurance expensive, but we don't seem to be making any attempt to fix the problem. And people who complain that universal health care would ruin the country are the ones who can afford it. They don't realize how hard it is to have to pay $100 for every physical you need, or hundreds of dollars for simple, even generic medicines. Going without health insurance is the worst thing for me right now. If I wasn't in school, I'd be screwed.
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--The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return--