It's the 4th of July. Whoopie. I'm sitting on the couch listening to music, waiting for hubby's mom and brother to come over. So why not blog, right?
I actually feel like writing though. I feel like I need to get stuff out. I'm just not sure I can do it in a manner that makes sense.
Lets start with TMS. I met with Dr. H again on Tuesday. Hubby came. Dr. H informed me that he had spoken to my psychiatrist (Dr. M) and Dr. M believes my appropriate diagnosis is bipolar disorder. Meaning he won't change my diagnosis to depression in order for me to be approved for TMS. I understand. That would be fraud. But it sucks. Because, as Dr. H informed us, there is a 99.9% chance that insurance will NOT approve me for TMS. Then starts the appeal process. Dr. H said that I would not be approved at the 2nd tier of the process, but there's a small chance I could be approved at the 3rd tier when my case would be sent to a independent reviewer. This would take around 6 months. Six. Fucking. Months. Apparently the FDA is working on possibly approving bipolar disorder for TMS which would mean that my insurance would have to cover me. But again, that's 6 months to a year out and it's not guaranteed.
You have no idea how horrible I felt, sitting there listening to this news. My heart dropped. I felt hopeless and helpless.
Dr. H then began to tell us about another option: paying for TMS out of pocket. I put my head down. I know we can't afford this. But hubby asked, "How much?" Are you ready? $400 per treatment and the standard is 36 treatments. That's $14,400. Tears welled up in my eyes. Now, granted, that's not as much as I thought it was going to cost, but it's still $14,400 we don't have.
"If you're paying out of pocket we cut the cost in half," Dr. H said. "And we can set up a payment plan." Hubby sounded interested and started asking questions. I zoned out, head spinning, knowing that my hopes had been ripped from my hands.
We left, me in tears, so much so that hubby said he would drive us home. He said we would figure it out. Figure what out? I'm going to be denied coverage and we can't afford to pay out of pocket. I felt like screaming. Hubby started talking about our money in savings, about trying to sell more of my paintings, of starting a GoFundMe. He has all these ideas about how we could make it work. How yes, we truly can afford to pay out of pocket. He told me yesterday that he wants me to call Dr. H on Monday to get everything set up for me starting treatment.
He wants me to start treatment.
Here's where we come to the second thing I want to talk about: how I don't feel as though I'm worthy of going through treatment. I don't think I should. I'm already a burden, a drain, and now I'm going to be a financial burden. Again. Me being a financial burden is why we lost our house 4.5 years ago. I don't want a repeat. I don't want our family to struggle because of me.
This is eating me up inside. I truly don't think I'm worth the money. I don't think I'm worth the time or effort. I'm not worth it. This is me thinking I'd be better off dead. That everyone would be better off with me dead. I don't know how to reconcile this thinking. If I go through treatment with this mindset I'm sure to fail. I'm trying to counter all my negativity with positive thoughts. I'm trying not to catastrophize. I'm trying to remember all the good in my life, but these thoughts persist. I don't know what to do. I don't know why I don't feel worthy. I don't know why I feel as though I'm rubbish. I don't know why and I don't know what to do about it.
I have therapy coming up on Monday and my therapist definitely has his work cut out for him. I need to get this all sorted out. I need help. I need help.
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