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(Some parts may be considered gross. Read at your own risk.)
I've just spent the better part of a day and a half laid up with a mild case of food poisoning. I say it's that because that's what my boyfriend, who used to be an OR nurse before he found his calling in working with deranged (literally) teenagers, suspects it is. He suspects that because there was blood in the vomit.
Why am I not in the hospital right now? Why am I sitting around hoping this goes away on its own (and it seems to be -- I was able to keep a dinner of ice cream down)?
Because I have no health insurance. I have worked in motel hell for more than five years, and aside from the low pay (I found out that a girl who works at my favorite Subway restaurant makes $1.50 more per hour than I do and she's been there two years), my biggest complaint is that I have no health insurance. I'm living on borrowed time and I don't like it.
Sure I've tried to escape. Many times, in fact, but before I learned that my resume was defective, I was turned down for everything I applied for except, ironically, a job with a mental health provider that went tits up within a month of hiring me.
I've reached the point that I did actually apply at a factory where a friend works. If hired, I'll babysit plastic molding and injection presses for twelve hours a day, while wearing a hair net and a beard net that will make me look like an idiot. I'll be working the night shift because that's all they're hiring for right now, so I won't even get the pleasure of working with my friend. I'll likely be bored senseless, and either my coworkers will hate me or I'll hate them. That's pretty much just how things work in factories, or so says my brother, who has worked in a printing plant for going on 20 years and has on more than one occasion nearly been driven to the point of a nervous breakdown by it.
However, the job offers health insurance, life insurance, profit sharing, and the pay starts out at $1.25 more per hour than I make at the motel.
So, I'll take it if they'll have me. I'll hate every second of it, but at this point anything would be better than motel hell. And also, when I eat a bad batch of nachos again, at least I'll be able to go to the hospital and not have to debate first whether going to the hospital will force me to either sell my car or declare bankruptcy.
Those of you with health benefits through your jobs, count your blessings.
I've just spent the better part of a day and a half laid up with a mild case of food poisoning. I say it's that because that's what my boyfriend, who used to be an OR nurse before he found his calling in working with deranged (literally) teenagers, suspects it is. He suspects that because there was blood in the vomit.
Why am I not in the hospital right now? Why am I sitting around hoping this goes away on its own (and it seems to be -- I was able to keep a dinner of ice cream down)?
Because I have no health insurance. I have worked in motel hell for more than five years, and aside from the low pay (I found out that a girl who works at my favorite Subway restaurant makes $1.50 more per hour than I do and she's been there two years), my biggest complaint is that I have no health insurance. I'm living on borrowed time and I don't like it.
Sure I've tried to escape. Many times, in fact, but before I learned that my resume was defective, I was turned down for everything I applied for except, ironically, a job with a mental health provider that went tits up within a month of hiring me.
I've reached the point that I did actually apply at a factory where a friend works. If hired, I'll babysit plastic molding and injection presses for twelve hours a day, while wearing a hair net and a beard net that will make me look like an idiot. I'll be working the night shift because that's all they're hiring for right now, so I won't even get the pleasure of working with my friend. I'll likely be bored senseless, and either my coworkers will hate me or I'll hate them. That's pretty much just how things work in factories, or so says my brother, who has worked in a printing plant for going on 20 years and has on more than one occasion nearly been driven to the point of a nervous breakdown by it.
However, the job offers health insurance, life insurance, profit sharing, and the pay starts out at $1.25 more per hour than I make at the motel.
So, I'll take it if they'll have me. I'll hate every second of it, but at this point anything would be better than motel hell. And also, when I eat a bad batch of nachos again, at least I'll be able to go to the hospital and not have to debate first whether going to the hospital will force me to either sell my car or declare bankruptcy.
Those of you with health benefits through your jobs, count your blessings.
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