So today is my 36th Birthday... it all seems a bit bittersweet... I have given up my apartment, moved home, stopped working and have fought the Insurance company. All in the past 5 months (well, stopped working in April but the rest has been recent). I am really hoping that today will be the start of something better, something new, something special... I would raise a glass to all these things, however I have discovered that my medications + alcohol = red, itchy hives... so I will just ask that the Goddess hears me and and embraces me. Blessed be.
Colette " Sekhet" Uncertain - 14 years, 10 months, 9 days ago

Well... it's almost the end of December and 2009 and I'm still not working. I have been fighting the Long Term Disablility company because they denied my claim in September. Employment insurance has been so long in coming that I have had no income since August and have maxed my credit out and had to borrow money from my parents. So now I have a lawyer and hopefully we will beat the LTD company and force them to pay up, I want damages which just may happen as my lawyer is willing to sue them if they don't accept my appeal. It has been very stressful and a serious hit to my self-confidence as I have now lost my apartment and have had to move home to my parent's house. In some ways it is a blessing, as I need to additional support to do the basic activities of daily living and my mom needs support dealing with my dad and foster-brother, so a win-win situation. Well hopefully. So things have been complicated.
Colette " Sekhet" Uncertain - 14 years, 10 months, 25 days ago

So I have been off work since April 13th and was just approved for the next month... approved until July 12th. I had some serious issues with the Insurance company that holds our Short Term Disablity policy which included calls placed to my HR Manager at work and my case workers manager. My initial call with them left me feeling humiliated and completely emotionally run over. I was not able to explain my position or anything and I felt that the woman had no idea how to handle someone in emotional distress. I have never expected nor want sympathy for my contition, but a little bit of compassion and empathy isn't that much to ask. Especially since my employer had chosen this particular company because they stated that their case workers were RNs and that they had empathy. We in my first dealings with them, there was definitely no empathy or compassion at all. So I complained and was given a new case manager who has actually been pretty good.

Unfortunately all this time off has not had the positive change in my health I was hoping so far. All the stress from getting the medical proof that I'm ill has actually made me sicker, the insurance company was calling every two weeks and after a couple of serious flare ups I said enough. I told the doctor that all this was stressing me out and that I couldn't cope with the constant pressure of proving how ill I was. So he told the company that they were actually causing more distress and making me more ill that they now don't call me until my monthly report from my doctor is sent to them. Which has made somethings a bit easier. I must say I am look forward to a couple of weeks here at my parents were I don't have to worry about all the crap going on in the city. Though I miss working outside in the garden and I'm sure it is totally overgrown again by now.... I was so happy to get one third of it cleared out and landscape fabric down and I still have many plants that need to go into the ground.... eeeesssshhhh.... not sure how I'm going to get it all done, since I am only able to do about an hour of work - chores, errands, gardening - before I'm back in bed for at least 2 hours and all hepped up on Percs for the pain.... I guess an hour is better than nothing and hopefully I will slowly work up to 2 hours...
Colette " Sekhet" Uncertain - 15 years, 5 months, 2 days ago

So on Thursday I finally told work just how bad things were by sending in a scan of the doctor's note saying that I was off work until further notice due to medical reasons. So I am now in the process of getting the paperwork together for the insurance company so that I can get Short Term Disablity.... one thing about my work is that we have amazing benefits... just re-read our STD policy and now it is 17 full weeks at 100% salary... so included the first week of sick days that is a total of 18 weeks... I'm getting my first summer off since high-school.... woot.... however, it took me becoming seriously ill to get it. But on the bright side I will not have to worry about work until mid-August and hopefully I will be able to bloaster up my immune system and get my vitamin and mineral defientincies sorted out and maybe even relieve some of the fatigue. Crossing fingers and toes!!!
Colette " Sekhet" Uncertain - 15 years, 7 months, 11 days ago

So the blood work is in.... and it would seem that not only I have low zinc levels, but I'm on the borderline of having scurvy... yup I said scurvy. The disease that killed off sailors galore. Somehow my body is not able to process vitimin C or somehow it gets sucked up by my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome so that my body doesn't have enough. Also, when they tested my cortisol - the hormone released to deal with stress - is completely messed too... I figured she was going to say that it was off the charts but it is actually next to nothing. So, no wonder I can't handle stress or even mildly stressful situations... my body does not release enough hormone to actually tell the brain to deal with it. I knew I was messed up... but that now seems like an understatement. Essshhh scurvy.... aaarrrrgggg matey.
Colette " Sekhet" Uncertain - 15 years, 7 months, 18 days ago