My new health plan:

Don't get sick or in a car accident.

When I added my husband and son to my insurance a few years ago, my premiums went from about $75 a month to about $250 a month. So when Tyson started filling out paperwork for his new job and went to add me and his son to his policy, he realized it was going to cost nearly $800.

EIGHT HUNDRED DOLLARS A MONTH. That's nearly what we pay in rent. Shit. Just covering him and Nick is only going to run $140. So basically I'm out on my ass on this one. (Even if he had considered it, I would have asked for the $650 in cash every month instead and bought myself something nice.)

So today I've spent some time reviewing my other options for healthcare:

1. Go without, and hope for the best. I'm under thirty, in fairly good overall health. Odds are good I'll find a job with its own insurance in a few months. Tyson went without for like 30 years and still made it through okay. Plus, no insurance means I can go to the free clinic for my lady problems.
The major drawback to this plan is that pesky pre-existing conditions thing. Between the skin cancer, clinical depression, and history of frequent abnormal PAPs, I don't think I could get the care I needed when I got coverage again (and when I eventually need that hysterectomy, I don't want to be the one footing the bill).

2. COBRA. Because I voluntarily left my job, I don't qualify for reduced rates. Keeping my current level of benefits will cost about $650 a month, leaving us no better off than we were before. Or I can get an "at least I'm not fucked if I have to go to the hospital" plan with like a $3000 deductible for under a hundred bucks. Not really a lot of middle ground here.

3. Private short-term insurance. Depending on the deductible and co-payment involved (from 20% to a whopping SEVENTY PERCENT), I can get middling coverage for between $70 and $250 a month. Problem: The maximum length for this type of insurance is six months. I'm fairly confident of having an insurance-providing job by then, but the universe (and the economy) may have me waiting tables at Applebee's six months from now instead.

4. Private regular old insurance (AKA "Corporate Ass-Rape"). Basically for a lot of money I can have a shitty plan with a high deductible, with the option of continuing to pay the ridiculous premiums ad infinitum, if such is my desire.

I don't qualify for Medicare, I can't get insurance through my school, and, because I spent seven years as a liberal arts major, I have absolutely no skills that transfer to the non-school world, allowing me to get a good job in another field. Apparently, jobs in the field of sentence diagramming aren't required to provide benefits.

Being a grown-up sucks.