I’ve lost today, but I want to tell you why…

I wanted, so very badly, to be a productive author today.  That’s…. probably not going to happen.  The why of it matters though, and that’s what I want to address.

Republicans, more importantly the GOP political establishment, hate me.  Yes, I know that sounds insanely partisan.  However, I have Republicans that I love dearly, whom mean the world to me.  Republicans that I interact with on a daily basis, and who’s write I vigorously protect as I do my own.

That doesn’t stop the Republican Party in Washington, D.C. from hating me, however.  All the love and bipartisan action in the universe does not change that simple fact.  Why do they hate me, you ask?  How can I say such a thing about our elected officials?

One word: Healthcare.

I’m not well.  Due to genetic expression beyond my control, my brain chemistry is broken.  I don’t produce the appropriately balanced brain breakfast. It produces such lovely moments as leaving the refrigerator door open all day, leaving pots burning on the stove, leaving bread in the toaster, forgetting the cheese on the counter, etc.  Those are all funny, in their own way.  But I’m 32.  This isn’t supposed to be how my life works yet. That’s later, if I’m so lucky.

The second issue is far less fun.  I suffer from rather severe manic-depression.  I’ve made no secret of my suffering.  I wear my condition on my sleeve, because there isn’t anything shameful about it.  I get treatment for it in the same fashion that a cancer patient gets theirs: as a necessary part of daily life.  Make no mistake: Such conditions are deadly.  Improperly managed, my condition will kill me.  I’ve gotten that low once already, and it’s a dark moment when you realize the only thing keeping you from ending it all is not really anything at all.  A hope and a prayer that you won’t do it.  End of list.

I’ve gotten help, I’ve gotten a support network, I’ve adjusted medications and sought all the professional armor I can gird myself with.  I have a son, and I cannot do less than everything in my power to make sure I’m here for him as long as I can be.  He deserves that much from me.

Today, I learned that all my hard work might be so much wasted effort.  No only are GOP members of Congress and the Senate ruminating over their latest health care bill, it’s going to be even worse for everyone than it already was prior, when it flopped.  Not only will I be completely cut off from obtaining reasonably priced healthcare if I’m not part of a long term employment situation (which may happen sooner rather than later), but I’m also going to be up shit creek without so much as a boat because my conditions are ‘pre-existing’.

Meaning that I’m ill, with a long-term pair of incurable conditions, and rather than allow me the dignity and humanity to manage my condition and have things like a house, or a car, or raise a child, I’m now going to be forced to choose between shady sleight-of-hand or outright begging on crowd funding sites to actually allow for my life to continue to grow in the fashion that it has in this last year.

That’s what has me so completely steamed today.  That’s why there is no story to follow this, that’s why there is no salve to ease this cut.  I’m so close, so desperately close, to actually carving the life I want to live out of this wonderful, terrible existence we share, and then the uncaring Grand Ol’ Party comes along and sweeps my legs out from under me.  For no better reason than their rich friend asked them to.  There isn’t a morally or monetarily justifiable argument for removing the insurance protections that we now enjoy.  There isn’t.  Not one single objective measurement, removed from any political ideology, has indicated that either the old or the new healthcare legislation will do ANYTHING to assist the people who currently use it.  Nothing.  Nada. Zilch.  Zip.

So here I am, stuck in the middle, about to lose everything I’ve worked so hard for over the last year, for no reason whatsoever, by men and women who will never feel any of the negative consequences of their actions.  It’s wrong, it’s reprehensible, and ultimately no one will be forced to pay any penalty for their cold indifference to the suffering of humans directly caused by their actions.  Because that’s life in the US of A right now: Bad men do bad things, and get to laugh all the way to the bank.

Frustratingly,
Justin