Care

I know I've touched on this before, but it bears repeating. And I'll try to keep it in concrete, monetary terms to avoid being immediately dismissed as a bleeding-heart liberal socialist.

My name is Rebecca. I am 36 years old and I live and work in New York City. I am a technical editor for a national engineering society and I hold a Bachelor's degree, i.e., I am a skilled laborer in a field essential to the functioning of our country's infrastructure. I am single and have no children. I live in a studio apartment in a walk-up building. I have no credit cards or outstanding loans. I make approximately $2,300 a month, and I live, quite literally, from paycheck to paycheck. My monthly rent, gas, electricity, cable, phone, grocery, laundry, and transportation expenses total approximately $2,100. I do not buy gourmet, organic, or otherwise expensive specialty food; I do my own laundry. I try to deposit $100 a month into a savings account, which leaves $100 remaining.

I also have arthritis in one toe, scoliosis, hearing loss in one ear, a family history of cancer and heart disease, and bipolar disorder. $100 per month doesn't even come close to covering the medical expenses associated with these conditions. A single routine trip to the gynecologist would wipe that sum out completely and leave me still owing more.

This is why I am grateful for my employee health benefits and support the public option.

Before going any further, let me address some of the societal stigmas surrounding my situation. Foremost, I am not lazy or looking for a handout — I went to college to improve my chances for employment; I earned a degree to remain competitive in the job market; I paid off my debts, plus interest. I work 40 hours a week doing indisputably meaningful work, meaning it produces calculable, tangible results, as opposed to what some consider subjective, such as fashion design or social work. I pay my dues. I make considerable efforts to stay healthy. My arthritis and scoliosis are hereditary. I was born with hearing loss. I have no influence over my family history. None of these things are my fault and I did not bring them on myself. I deserve a fair chance, along with those who through sheer luck have been born and remain free of disabilities.

Which brings me to bipolar disorder.

Mental illness is a divisive issue. Many are of the mindset that "it's all in your head; you're a smart person, you should be able to work this out yourself." Even I was. And then I almost failed out of college, despite being a straight-A student all through high school. I cried to professors when explaining how I couldn't finish assignments and was totally lost trying to force myself to understand the simplest concepts. I was fired from jobs for not being able to keep my anger in check or my emotions under control — I yelled at bosses, I yelled at customers; I'd lock myself in a bathroom stall several times a day to cry over the pressure of even the simplest tasks — asking a customer if they needed help, delivering a form to a supervisor, booking a hotel room for the boss's out-of-town guest. And all the while I knew this was not normal behavior, and still couldn't stop it. It took me an extra year and a half to graduate, and in the span of 5 years, I was fired from 3 jobs. This wasn't merely a depression over a few failed relationships, this was more taxpayers' money spent on my education than necessary and a liability to the businesses I worked for.

I've lived with these issues to some degree for over 2 decades. I get no pleasure or benefit out of living this way, and I believe my current position serves as evidence that I am at least a somewhat smart person, so it stands to reason that if I could help myself, I would have. Therefore, I could keep up this routine for the rest of my life, not really accomplishing anything for myself or for society, actually being a burden to society by either wasting others' time and effort failing at jobs or by collecting unemployment — a significantly greater expense than the approximately $250 per month retail value of my medications or the approximately $55 per month premium for the insurance provided by my employer — or, what it comes down to, some of the richest people in the world could chip in some relatively petty change to help me help society, instead of complaining about my drain on it.

After all, I pay my taxes. I help fund the police, the post office, public parks. I pay for roads and public schools, even though I don't drive and I'm not a student, nor do I have a child who is a student. I pay for public television, even though I don't have children, because I want my niece to have the same access to educational programming that I had, even if my brother and sister-in-law aren't able to afford it themselves. I pay Social Security, even though it's possible the fund will be depleted by the time I'm ready to collect, because my mom has worked hard all her life, and I want her to be able to support herself if she needs help and I can't afford it — she shouldn't have to suffer for my insufficiencies. I am not trying to scam anyone out of anything. My country guarantees me the same right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as anyone else. If you want to keep our country great, you will help its people, because without us all, there is no country.