I didn't want to post this until it became official, but it recently became official, so....
Awhile back, I posted a dreary sob story about how I was probably going to lose my health insurance due to a major household change (my mother's sudden passing). This would've been disastrous, as I have a grocery store's worth of afflictions that require handfuls of medications, expensive tests, and numerous doctor appointments along with the occasional expensive procedure.
(No, I'm not trooning out - these are just "normal" problems, many of which stem from my age.)
If I wasn't able to secure insurance, I was seriously thinking of just ending it all, as I'm not going into medical bankruptcy.
Well, after reading the posts in here as to how to "hack" the healthcare.gov site, I did exactly that - redid my application and documented $18,000 as my projected total income for 2026. It was at this point that magic started to happen and I was being presented with eminently suitable plans for around $70/month. Obviously, this involves serious subsidies, so I won't be getting a tax refund, but that's not even on my radar.
I then visited my local BCBS (Blue Cross/Blue Shield) office to ensure that all the i's get dotted and t's crossed. I do this every year, as I don't entirely trust doing something this critical purely online. And it's a good thing I did, as the rep who looked at my application paired it with an equivalent plan that only cost a little over $40/month. I was even offered a decent-looking dental plan that I'm considering.
And I just got my new insurance cards in the mail on Wednesday, so I deem things to be a done deal.
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I cannot, CANNOT thank those people enough in here who told me what to do to get the subsidies invoked. Y'all literally saved my life, as my suicide threat was VERY real and I had already assembled the pills that would do it (no "call for help", just 100% death).
If you ever run into a KF detractor who says the site is only good for getting people to jump off bridges, show them this post as proof of the complete opposite,.
I'm still coming to grips with my mother's passing, so it's not like my mind is in a great place, but at least this gargantuan issue has now been resolved. My GP prescribed some pills which he said will help with the grief in the long run, but they won't metabolize fully for another month, so it's now a waiting game.
In any event, if people want me to donate $100 to a mutually-agreed upon charity, I'll happily do so and say it came from The Farms (I assume Null is okay with that). I can't do crypto, though, only Paypal and credit card.
THANKS AGAIN!
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