Chapter 8

Monday found me and Mom sitting in a doctor’s office waiting to be called back. I had used her restrictions to avoid most interactions with my cousins so far but ended today. We were here to get the soft cast off and the stitches out. Hearing my name called I looked over and saw a nurse waiting at the door with a clipboard.

We headed back with the usual stop at the scale for height and weight. 56” and 70 lbs. Not too impressive in height or weight. If the wind picked up, I needed to carry tent stakes to stake down my shoes. The puberty train had still not arrived and I was left waiting nervously at the platform praying the train had not somehow derailed just out of my sight.

We were led into a small room and I was asked to sit on the exam table and Mom took the only other seat. After a quick blood pressure check and the nurse left saying the doctor would be with us shortly. I wanted to talk to Mom about something and this seemed like a good time since she wouldn’t raise her voice and we had time to kill. “Mom” she looked up from the magazine she was thumbing thru.

“yes”

“I saw the hospital bill in Friday’s mail. Are we going to be alright?” she just looked at me for a few seconds before replying “We’ll be fine Mark it’s not something you need to worry about” “But it’s my fault, I caused all this and I don’t know what to do” It sounded whiny even to me. “Mark it’s nobody’s fault, you had an accident and we will work it out with the doctors and hospitals.”

“Dr. Griefahn mentioned she was going to put you in touch with their Financial Aide Dept. Did they do anything?”

Mom smiled at me, “Yes they did Mark. They are working out a plan for us. They are going to forgive half the amount not covered by your Dad’s, Kevin’s she quickly corrected, Insurance then $25.00 a month for 12 months while we pay off the local emergency room. Then $50.00 a month for 48 more months. At the end of the 60 months, they will forgive any remaining balance if there is any.”

“Hey, if it’s any consolation you knocked out our annual deductible and our yearly out-of-pocket Maximum, which I didn’t even know existed.” “This insurance stuff is new to me too” “I’ve never had insurance before marrying Kevin.” “So, free medical for the rest of the year for everyone else.”

I did laugh at the absurdity of a huge medical bill having any kind of an upside. Even with a payment plan for the local emergency room, it was a minimum of $50.00 a month for the next 5 years. I was trying like hell to remember the 80’s minimum wage. If memory served me, $3 something, $3.25, or $3.50 somewhere in that range. So 20 hours of Mom’s wages at the truck stop for the next 5 years to clean up the mess I got us into. I still felt I had to figure out some way to help the family out.

All this future knowledge if it turned out to still be accurate meant nothing right here right now. I had no money, hell I didn’t even own a wallet. Mom went back to her aged Home and Garden magazine and I went back to brooding. Always play to your strong suites I say and I am a class “A” brooder. Silver or maybe Gold Medal if they add brooding to the Winter Olympics.

The Doctor was brusk but I didn’t care. He looked over the discharge instruction and then gave me a quick once over: inhale exhale say ahh follow the light. You know the routine and so did he. It’s unlikely he hit the 5-minute mark. I was saddened to think this was the better health care. In 30 years it wouldn’t even be a Doctor. He would be replaced by a Nurse Practitioner and They would be so harried you would be lucky to hit 3 minutes on the clock before they were off to the next room.