I flat out had one provider tell me that the top folks in the field had begun to leave the rolls of the insurance providers because they were tired of arguing for treatments and procedures that were being automatically denied on round 1 and similar ‘cost saving’ tactics… It is utter craziness. When I was trying to get my gastric bypass surgery past the clerks at Aetna in 1998 I finally threatened to come in and cut my wrists on their desk to prove it was having a detrimental effect on my mental health; I never did get a phone call back but I did get an approval notice for the surgery. I guess I want to say both hang in there and don’t be afraid to make bold strokes in defense of yourself – when the system becomes Gilliam-esquely Brazilian it really does call for that level of response, sometimes.

Until someone has been through something terrible like this, they just can’t understand how true your statement really is… With my son’s cancer, we went round and round with the insurance company on just how many MRIs he could have. Thankfully, we have a great Children’s Hospital and they took care of most of it, but it’s so frustrating to deal with healing AND bureaucracy at the same time.

Hang in there, Jay.