Please note, this entry is extremely candid, and written from personal experience, so if you don't like it, please just scroll on past. It's about how completely screwed up the women's health care system is right now, and the battle I fought within that system for one year and one day. More importantly, it's about how it needs to improve, and that finally it seems to have done so in one small but significant way. If that seems like something you can stomach, read on.
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A friend of mine from back in El Paso posted this article today. Of course anything in women's health is big to her since she's a midwife, but this one was really interesting to me because of the struggle I have gone through for one year and one day, ending just 12 hours ago. This "war on women" thing they talk about in the press is very real. There are a lot of barriers to good health care, and real freedom of choice. It's very strange the things people think they have the right to legislate on, or restrict, or the way regular people get pushed to the wayside in some big chess game of special interests and pharmaceutical companies.
You see, one year and one day ago, Chai was born. After both of my previous births, I went back to the CNM who attended those births, and had her place a copper IUD for me. It's the only form of contraception I'll use (well... as far as kinds a doctor or midwife has to hook you up with anyway). Chai's birth was different, though. It was a CPM attended homebirth, and CPM's do not have the authority to place IUD's like CNM's do, so in El Paso, my only option was to find a doctor to do it.
I really dislike doctors, especially OB/GYN's. I don't trust them. I don't like the awkwardness of how they always ask me about my births, and look at me funny when they find out that I don't birth in hospitals, and that my big babies weren't c-sections or inductions, and that I didn't have anything bad happen from birthing such large babies naturally, nowhere near a hospital. I know they think I'm reckless and maybe a little crazy, even though I know better. They are not part of my world, but in El Paso, there was no choice, so I chose a doctor a lot of people I know seem to like ok, whom I knew took my insurance, and scheduled an appointment. By then, Chai was 4 months old, since that's how long it took us to save up the copay on a simple office visit. Thak was working at BMW at that time, and making very little money. He said we'd scrape together the money and get my IUD one way or another, so I went ahead and did a consult for that when I went in. I ended up not scheduling a second appointment just because I knew there was no way we'd be able to afford it.
I had to go back in six months anyway because my pap came back abnormal and they wanted to repeat it, so I did. By that time, Thak was working at his current job, we had our HSA, and we could afford my IUD. I was so happy, and again, I had them do the workup for it. A week later, the office staff called me and told me that there was very good news. My pap came back normal (Yay!) and that my insurance company had approved my Mirena IUD, but my cost share would be 100% because my deductible wasn't met. Wait a minute, you never asked me what kind of IUD I wanted. I don't want a Mirena. It's full of hormones. I want Paragard, which is made of copper. I was told they don't do Paragard. I asked if they could order it in. No. I asked if they could order it in if I prepaid for it. No. Finally, I asked if I found another practice who would do it, if they would fax my records to them so I didn't have to go through it all again, and they said they would do that.
I called every doctor in El Paso who wasn't male (because I just don't do male doctors), and wasn't this one practice that I had a horrible experience with a couple years prior, and only one of them was even willing to do Paragard. I was so happy until they asked me what insurance I have. I told them I have United Healthcare, and they told me they were only accepting military patients, so I was out of luck. By then, Thak was due home from Maryland any day, and we were moving to GA, and I knew I could go back to the birth center I had Orren at, and they would do it for me, so I resigned myself to waiting a while longer.
When I arrived in GA, I set up an appointment. I had to wait a month for it, but I had an appointment finally, and I knew they would do it for me. Finally, the day came for my appointment, and everything went perfectly. Then all we had to do was wait for my records to be faxed from TX, then get my insurance company's approval, and then order in my IUD. All of this took another month, but today, a year and a day after Chai was born, I FINALLY got my IUD. We had to pay $800 for it. Thank goodness that Thak's firm matches our HSA contributions, or we would not have been able to afford it even now.
Some might look at this and say that the system didn't work against me, or that it's my own fault for being so picky, but while that may play a part, I don't think it's right to dismiss stories like mine off hand. I don't think I was asking too much. I don't want to fill my body with synthetic hormones that can give me cancer, bone loss, weight gain, and who knows what else, and I don't think that's wrong. I don't want to have a fourth baby. We can't afford one, and another pregnancy would not be good for me physically. For the longest, we couldn't afford to throw down an $800 copay to buy an IUD for me.
So what were we left with? Abstinence? (Yes, GOP, I'm sure you'd love to add that to your school curriculum. "Look, kids! We even encourage happily married couples in their 30's to use abstinence! It's that good!") Condoms? Natural family planning? These are all a total crap shoot. It is a miracle I didn't get pregnant again in the year I spent fighting the system and waiting. It
really is. Thank goodness for breastfeeding and the way it inhibits
fertility a bit, allowing some of these crap shoot methods to work a bit more effectively than they normally would. If I hadn't been breastfeeding, I know I would be
expecting baby #4 right now, and not due to stupidity, laziness, or any failure of my own. I do not consider it a failure on my part that I was unwilling to use hormone based contraception with vast health consequences, nor give up an important part of my marriage. I don't think those are options anyone should have to be put in a position of taking.
It isn't right that the insurance that we pay a lot of money for each month isn't currently required to pick up the tab for IUD's. The change that the Obama administration has brought in requiring them to do that is a necessary one, and the sooner it becomes effective, the better. I found my way through the current mine field, but I don't wish that on anyone. I think anybody who's in my position should be able to walk into a doctor's office, tell them what form of contraception they want, and insurance pick up the tab for that. It's not asking much. This isn't welfare. This isn't a government handout. We pay a lot of money every month to have this insurance. It's crazy to pay hundreds a month in premiums and then they don't even cover half the stuff we need. Sure, they'd cover screenings I don't need until I'm 40 or 50 years old, but they won't cover the IUD I need when I'm 20 or 30. That makes absolutely no sense.
It's time to stop this war on women. I got through my part of it, and I'm ok. I feel a great sense of relief and calm now that I finally have what I need, and my life feels a lot more normal than it did even just yesterday. The fact that it was so hard to get to this point has to change, and I'm so glad it's going to. I really do not want to see friends go through this tomorrow, or my daughter in 20 years.
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