How Am I?

So I have an appointment with my doctor tomorrow at 9:30 am, and I am sure when he walks through the door into the examining room he will hold out his hand and ask me how I am? Isn't that what they all do? So while I was doing my 2 1/2 mile walk this morning I tried to think about how I really am so when I get a chance to answer the question for real I will have something intelligent to say.

Well, I'll be 62 in a few weeks and I can eat anything without feeling bad. I get up to pee a couple of times a night, but who doesn't at my age? Neither my wife or kids has any serious diseases. I don't have any chest pains, abdominal pains or anything else that could be serious. I take 20mg of prozac a day so I am pretty much anxiety free, and I have been taking blood pressure meds since I was 26, so I am doing all I can to preserve my plumbing and vital organs.

I have two businesses that are really a challenge right now in this horrible economy, my health care premiums just went up because I am getting older, I live in a nice house in Naples, Fla. and I can buy pretty much whatever I want at the grocery, although we have stopped eating out because of the cost. My kids are out of the house so I have more time with my wife than I have had in 25 years, and that is a real wonderful novelty!

So I guess I am doing pretty well, all things considered, especially when I compare my life with what I see all around me--bad marriages, kids who are threatening their parents with suicide, families where both parents have been laid off and they don't have any savings, friends who have lost everything to Bernie Madoff's ponzi scheme, blah, blah, blah.

I watched a documentary yesterday on Bill Moyers Journal called 'Critical Care' that portrayed the horrors of three people who don't have health coverage and are having a desperate time. The three people are all younger than me. Two of them died from horrible diseases, cancer and liver disease, both of which could have been prevented if they had not been afraid to go to the doctor because of the cost. The third was a 45 year old man with three kids and a fourth on the way. He had degenerative spinal disease that required an operation that cost $150,000 and he had no insurance. He was so stooped over he could not work, and simply because he was the subject of the documentary, he was given the necessary surgery as a gift. But what about the thousands of people who are not subjects of documentaries?

My health insurance premiums just went up, but at least I have insurance, but how good is it really? Not great....it is what I call catastrophic coverage. If God forbid I need something really big, it will be there, but for the run of the mill wellness coverage, I am forced into a high deductible policy that means I have to pay premiums and deductibles of over $20,000 before I get covered for anything big. What if I didn't have that money to pay??

And so I listen to all these assholes Republicans and conservatives who oppose anything that means real reform of health care because they are all in the pockets of the insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies. I read the editorials and wonder if this country really has the balls to do anything for the average person anymore. It makes me fearful. I fear the civil unrest when all of this boils over and the gun nuts decide to kill all the liberals. I listen to the vitriol from the right wing conservative talk mouths and wonder what ever happened to 'benefit of the doubt' and truth.

As for me, I guess I am ok......for now.