The insurance company denied me IDP

[Guest Emily Ray]

I am not going to be starting Intensive Day Program anytime soon. Despite my provider's best efforts to persuade the powers that be, that my ED is severe and most likely won't be helped by IOP it was determined IOP or nothing!!! When I called my insurance company the woman infered that because I am on a government provided insurance plan I should consider myself lucky to be getting that much.

Now I am not exactly asking for the cadillac of treatments. I am simply asking for something that has a chance of working! I am not one with a simple case of ED, if there ever was such a thing! I have treatment resistant severe depression w/ over a dozen hospitalizations over the past four years. I have GID and we all know how that can complicate the easy decisions like what do I wear tomorrow, much less the hard stuff like an Eating Disorder. On top of all this I am an addict newly in recovery. Now that is just the purely clinical picture. Now add to all that crap my social situation. My girlfriend and I are no more. While we are still friendly we aren't talking. Said ex-girlfriend is faceing gross misdemeanor assault on an officer charges among others from an incident stemming from my use of a service dog. That will be going to trial June 25th. Next on the list is a friend of mine who is HIV positive is having problems. Her CD4 count is droping quickly and without explination. I think that is enough to drive anyone to insanity, but there is more I won't bother to discuss. Anyways, I don't have the energy to really fight it. I think I need to get a county case manager.

Huggs

Emily

[Guest Elizabeth K]

You might do better with some help. Fighting all this alone is causing you too much stress.

Lizzy

[Guest Emily Ray]

By the time I go through the initial interview and get assigned a casemanager and then get her up to speed the battle will be over. So, I more than likely won't get a case manager. What I deserve or even require are no longer important in this age of managed care! And for those of you who think a single payer system is the way to go, your crazier than I am. Government health care has never done one thing for me that I couldn't have done on my own with a few trips to mexico. And now when I need them the most they say "screw you." it is sad that the system requires the sick to fight for their own health when they have the fewest resources mentally and physically to do so. How is it smart medicine to set up a system so backwards. Everything written about treating ED in the last five years says to treat it aggresively, early and the patient has the best chance of recovery. It has a mortality rate as high as 19% and an additional 20% develops into a life long pattern of relapse and recovery followed by relapse. How is it justified to pick the cheapest treatment first? Does the insurance man really think that a disorder that moved to crisis level during ongoing psychotherapy is just going to sudenly disappear after sitting down and having a few meals with a therapist and a dietician? He needs to be in the psych ward for such deranged thinking!

Huggs

Emily

[Svenna]

Hi, Em!

Sounds like a rough day, eh?

Hmmm. Maybe case management is a good idea, as you suggested. No harm in getting a helping hand when you need it, I was on case management for several years, at a time when tying my own shoelaces was nearly impossible from the effects of psyche meds, and I don't know how I would have managed without it. I've been buried beneath TOO much stress and illness in my life, too, and asking for help was the correct answer for me at that time. Life is hard, ya know?

I don't know what the answer is for your eating issues, but maybe doing the program they suggest, for now, is still a step in the right direction?

Look at the progress you have made so far, you are doing better in a lot of ways, this is just another small obstacle...

Do you have a sponsor for your recovery process? I hope you do...

Stay strong, let the bad stuff roll off ya like water off a duck's back.

Sending you Love and prayers, Svenna

[Guest CariadsCarrot]

I'm so sorry Emily.

Gabe

[Guest Emily Ray]

Today, I tried to not restrict and now I feel sick and over stuffed and disgusting. I don't know how I will ever get past this feeling! I was reading somewhere that recovery from an eating disorder can take five years! Ick!

Huggs

Emily