Crohn's Chronicles--A Writer's Life Interrupted

From this weekend's blog hop, the winner's are: E-books Jean and Dianna.(Check your e-mail) The agate goes to KatieO.  You see my grandson is Irish and according to him the beautiful stone could only go to another Irish person.

On to Crohn's Chronicles.

The Humira saga continues. I received a pre-recorded phone call last Friday that said my prescription (no they did not leave the name of the prescription) was approved. After doing the happy dance, I waited hopefully, expectantly, excitedly, (enough adverbs) for it to arrive. I’d be late a week or two, but not, I thought, an unrecoverable event.  

On Monday, when I still didn’t have anything, I called Medco again. After being on hold for almost an hour while someone went searching for some specialty pharmacy or whatever, I finally hung up. On Tuesday, I went to my Medco portal to find out what was wrong. After clicking incessantly for several minutes, I discovered my prescription had disappeared.

Poof

Like not even there, not even my old one. All Humira gone from my account as if it never existed. Another phone call—long wait—no response. An e-mail sent—long wait—no response.  Thankfully, the disease had been relatively quiet. I managed through my grandson’s graduation, his party, being out of town, with only a few minor mishaps. In fact, things were going so well I considered remission.

Remission is a funny word in Crohn’s because for most of us it means different things.  Give me 2-3 days of feeling good and I’m ready to start thinking I’ve pulled it off and remission is possible.  Of course, there were two days last week I had to hurry a co-worker out of the restroom because of my, ah, condition and I learned to never, ever, drink a Slurpee no matter how thirsty I am.

Today, the little voice in my head said, It’s baaaccck.

 The symptoms that led me into the doctor’s office to begin with reared their ugly heads today. So where does that leave me? In pain, but it’s not as bad as it once was and for that I’m grateful. Uncomfortable, but I’ll get to soak in a bathtub when I get home.  In a way, knowing what you have makes it easier, at least you’re not freaking out over every little symptom. And I have medication for when the pain gets overwhelming so there’s no panic. Well, no major panic. Being in pain is never fun.

I see my doctor tomorrow. I have no idea what’s going to happen. I do know I can’t pay the 2500.00 for this month’s medication. Three hundred dollars I can swing, but twenty-five hundred—every, single, month? Call me broke, destitute, bankrupt, just don’t call me solvent. Again, I don’t have many options left. If he switched my prescription to Cimzia would that make a difference?

So many questions.

Too few answers.

Not just for me, but for all of us.

(((hugs)))
Update: After being on hold for nearly an hour, and being switched from one person to the next, I finally broke down in tears and told them the next phone call would be from my lawyer. That got someone on the line that verified they had received authorization from the doctor, but they sent back the prescription because it was out of date. At that point I really lost it and they supposedly sent a 'note' to someone 'higher up' that would take care of the situation.

Stay tuned...

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