This happened a few months back, but still currently in the same situation. I recently graduated my Physical Therapist Assistant program (2021) and was lucky enough to find a job about 5 minutes from home. Everything was working out perfectly, I liked my job and coworkers, etc.. In September of last year I started having strange symptoms I’ve never had and I eventually had to go on FMLA in late October.
Originally, this job was through a contracting company for my local hospital, during this time the contracting company ended its contract with no warning and the hospital then hired all therapy staff that were laid off from the contracting company – except for me. Since I was still out on FMLA, the contracting company I was working for decided that there was no other jobs close enough for me and outright terminated me. Ending my health insurance at a time where I needed it most. Also, since I hadn’t been full time for over a year my short term disability benefits weren’t eligible to be continued. I’m still waiting for them to pay me for the time I was eligible for short term disability 4 months later.
Now I’m in a position where I’m paying for private insurance with a $9,600 deductible, can’t file for unemployment because technically I’m still not looking for work due to the illness, and haven’t received a single penny from any sort of disability claim. Living off of savings until that runs out. After that? Who knows.