I was laid off on 10/30, and my employer informed me that my health insurance coverage would end at the end of the month in which I was laid off. So as of 10/31, I no longer have health insurance, and that goes for my wife as well. I can't imagine why they chose 10/30 to lay me off instead of literally 2 days later…
My wife and I are financially responsible, as much as we can be in our current tax bracket. I dutifully saved up 3 months expenses in case of a situation like this, and my ex-employer even was “generous” enough to give me a whopping 2 weeks of severance, which I can stretch out to cover another month of expenses by cutting out all our non-essential spending. Oh, that two weeks of severance came after I signed away my rights to file any EEOC or other complaints against ex-employer. Classy.
I know this sub is the only one I could say this in, but I fully intended to draw unemployment insurance and take the next two months off. I have been working non-stop for the past 4 years, taking PTO only for illnesses and emergencies. I am starting college full-time in January and wanted to have a proper break to decompress and find a really good job that would allow me to focus on my studies. I was even willing to seek out something with less pay in order to accomplish this.
But my wife and I are both chronically ill and this is America. I take 4 daily medications and my wife takes 6. I'm sure you know where I'm going with this.
Even with 3 months of expenses, we're already realizing that this doesn't account for the sheer volume of medical expenses coming our way. My wife needs a monthly doctor's appointment to “review” her meds (IMO this is just a scam so her doctor can bill her more, since she's been on these meds for literally 3 years at this point at this current dosage). I also am currently on a new psychiatric pill which means I also need 6 week appointments with my Psychiatry PRN to make sure I'm not going nuts. Then we have the actual medications themselves, two of which have no generic alternative.
I feel so defeated. I applied for our state's Medicaid the day after I was laid off and still haven't heard back from them. Don't even ask me about COBRA to continue our previous coverage, the cost was absurd. This week alone my wife and I will be spending $600 on those doctor's appointments.
I am very lucky and I already have a 3rd interview lined up for a new job. I have been applying for work every day because a) it's required by my state's unemployment and b) maybe I would find something I really loved???
I don't want this job. It sounds just as bad or worse than my last job, the interviewer literally used the term “We treat each other like family here.” among other HUGE RED FLAGS.
I feel trapped. It's not even that I'm unwilling to get a job, I just wanted to find something, anything better. I wanted to have time to hunt down employers with ANY morals or empathy for their workers. I wanted to be able to focus on going back to college, I'm 33 years old and I'm committing to an entirely new degree path and future career NOTHING like my current skillset. I'm so beaten down by this fucking system, this fucking country, and I know they want it that way. I know I said I was angry in the title, but by this point I'm just…. tired.