Health care for all Americans. This is CHANGE I do belive in.

I've been working on this post for the past week. I think I am ready for the final draft.

The health care bill has finally passed through the House and signed by the president. The Reconciliation bill has been passed through the Senate and the final fixes are in place. I have two points to make about this:

1. it’s about time

2. It hasn't gone far enough, but it's a great start.

This is one of my three major issues for voting for a candidate. We have needed health care reform for a long, long time. The system has been bad and has gotten progressively worse as time has gone by. The government needs to regulate it. I have so many stories and experiences that I will go into here.

My first out of college/ real job was at a major insurance company, I worked as an admin in the life sales division. I would work regularly with the underwriters, negotiating prices and payment plans for our sales reps and their clients. I saw upfront and personal how these rates were created, I saw how people were sold into purchasing these policies, and I felt dirty going to work and dealing with this. Pressuring people to buy more insurance that was actually needed, because they could afford it, not because it was needed. Selling short term policies with high rates to young people instead of policies that would cover them for their whole life and used when needed at a lower rate that it would cost when they were more at risk of needing a payout. It was a horrible system.

I also had friend who worked in the health care claims department, they were given strict guidelines and rules to deny coverage for most procedures until the customer came back and fought the denial. That would be when they would use the "Dr. Office or hospital used the wrong code, go back to them" line. After much back and forth on the client side they finally would approve the claim, in the hopes that most people would just give up and pay out of pocket.

My most recent experience with the health care system was 2 years ago. To anyone that might not know I had stage 4 melanoma when I was 25 had a few surgeries and all of the cancer was removed. Yes I was very lucky that it didn't spread, and I am very lucky that I did not need further invasive procedures. I am thankful everyday for that.

A little over two years ago I lost my job, didn't have any savings, and could not afford the COBRA payments. I decided to try to get private health insurance. I was looking for emergency only coverage, you know the just in case coverage, so that if something happened, like I broke a leg or something like that I would not lose everything and owe tens of thousands of dollars in the process. Because I had cancer three years earlier I was tagged as uninsurable, even if I tried to add a rider that melanoma or even any cancer would not be covered by the policy, I could not get coverage. So here I was 28 years old, fairly healthy, and not able to have insurance. I did not find a full time position for almost six months, during that time I was scared to death that something would happen and I would not be able to pay for it, and therefore not be able to get help. That was not the first time that healthcare got personal.

That happened on August 9, 2001 when my cousin Diane Alaimo passed away. That was the first time that I realized that health care is only for the privileged few, it's not a right that is open to anybody.

Diane was a wonderful, caring, loving person. She was a standup comic by profession; she did not have access to employer sponsored health care. She had some minor issues which after that she was dropped and marked uninsurable. By the time that she found corporate employment with local radio station, and had access to healthcare it was already too late. She had major heart surgery on August 6, and was on machines for three days, after which her heart gave out, she was 46 years old. Had she had insurance and access to health care she could have still been with us. We would have still been laughing with her instead of crying and remembering the wonderful person she was. I still think about my cousin every day.

Now that within the next four years, every American will have access to affordable healthcare, hopefully less people will be saying goodbye to people they love because they can't see a doctor, and get the care that they need. Because in the next 6 months the insurance companies will not be able to drop its clients because they get sick, and they cannot deny a client because they happened to have ever been sick.

So how's that hopy changy thing working out?

Well because of this CHANGE, I have HOPE for our future.

Thank you President Obama, and Madame Speaker Pelosi, Thank you for helping to make America a country that I can be proud of again.

76 days and counting

Can't believe that I haven't posted in over 20 days, I really need to get back on track. So much to talk about right now. First of all I am now 76 days into quitting and I am doing great! Had a few close to weak moments, but have still not given in. Just need to make to it 100 days. I don't know what happens then, but I have convinced myself that it'll be better by then. I have been off the gum for over a month as well, so I'm nicotine free. I feel normal now. The first few weeks I noticed everything tasting and smelling better, but now it just feels normal. I am enjoying my life a lot more now that I am not taking smoke breaks from it. Now to work on losing weight.