Dear Lawmaker

Dear lawmaker,

The ACA saved my life. On May 17, 2013 - I collapsed on my floor not breathing, that moment changed my life forever. My husband, who served in the US Army for 16 years and who was a trained medic, performed CPR on me. My loving husband pounded on my chest and breathed into my mouth on my living room floor for what seemed like an eternity until the paramedics arrived. The ambulance took me to the hospital and my entire life changed in an instant. I was diagnosed with a terminal medical condition and I lost my job because I could not return to work when my medical leave ended 12 weeks later. My employer's COBRA premium was $1400.00 a month just for my individual coverage and I no longer had a salary to help me pay it. We put my car up for sale, and we sold off many of our processions trying to raise the money to pay my COBRA premiums. My friends posted a Go Fund Me page to try and help me raise enough money to afford my COBRA premiums and medical bills. We maxed out our credit cards and then opened a couple of new ones and maxed those out too. I was in the middle of life saving medical treatments, in the hospital hooked up to an IV and heart monitors, so there was no way I could go without insurance. It was terrifying lying in my hospital bed worrying that if I could not scrape up enough money to pay my COBRA premiums that I would lose my insurance and I would die.

I switched to an ACA plan as soon as they became available couple of months later. My new ACA plan premium cost only $131.00. I went from paying $1400.00 just for my individual COBRA coverage down to $131.00 for my individual ACA coverage. My ACA plan also offered better coverage than my employer's COBRA plan. My ACA plan allowed me to access the type of medical care I needed to save my life. My COBRA plan did not cover home infusion and I had spent weeks in the hospital, all alone. While my husband was working and doing his best to keep our family going, I was spending days and nights alone in my hospital room, away from my family because my COBRA plan did not cover home infusion treatments. Now my ACA plan did cover home infusion treatment and this allowed me to be treated at home with my family around me. I cannot explain how much it meant to me to come home and be with my family again. Being with my family gave me the strength to fight for my life. Without the ACA my medical care would have bankrupted my family. My family would have lost everything trying to pay for COBRA insurance, medical bills and I would have most likely died. My ACA plan saved my life and saved my family. 

I was extremely blessed to have a job that included Long Term Disability Insurance benefits as part of my employment package. It took another year and a half to apply for and receive those Long Term Disability Insurance Benefits from my previous employer. We cashed in my retirement plan and barely scraped by for a year and a half waiting for those Long Term Disability benefits to be finally awarded. It took an additional year beyond that for me to be awarded Social Security Disability Insurance benefits. It took nearly three years from when I collapsed on my living room floor until I received my first disability benefits. If I had not had that ACA plan my medical bills would have bankrupted my family while we waited for my disability insurance to be awarded.  I know I would have died and it would have financially ruined my family as well.

I live with a serious medical condition, which requires ongoing medical treatment including daily IV infusions, and multiple intravenous medications, all of which would be completely unaffordable without health insurance. Without health insurance, it would be impossible to afford my medical care and I cannot treat my condition through Emergency Room visits. There is no way to treat my medical condition by going to the ER, the way some legislators have so callously suggested.

My ACA insurance plan coverage allows me to stay at home, getting the vital medical care I need daily to stay alive while being able to be close to my family. This means so very much to be treated in my own home instead of spending weeks on end in a hospital. If the ACA is repealed, I will be at great risk for losing access to affordable healthcare because I have a pre-existing condition and will be placed in "high risk pools". I live on a fixed income, receiving Long Term Disability Insurance Benefits from my employer, and my medical expenses will only increase. I am one of those people who will need assistance to be able to continue to afford my health care but I don't want to have to become completely dependent on Medicaid. I worked hard all my life, to have a job with the kind of benefits that are helping my stay independent. I receive Long Term Disability Insurance benefits from my employer because I worked hard to have a job which included those benefits. I worked hard all my life and I want to pay for my own health care. I do not want to feel like a burden to my family. I do not want to feel like a burden to society. I am terrified that repealing the ACA will cause me to not be able to afford health insurance. Without access to medical care I will die and my family will be at great risk of bankruptcy in attempting to afford medical care for me. 

I spent my life working hard; I always had a job from high school onward and all through college and graduate school. I often worked two and three jobs while getting, Bachelors degree, my Master's degree and then PhD. After I finished my education, I became an educator, working as a college professor and years later coordinating higher education reform programs for our nation's oldest and most prestigious nonprofit education reform foundation. I worked hard all my life to achieve the American dream, becoming highly educated, and employed in a field that was actively working to change our country for the better. I was a homeowner raising my family. I was a taxpayer involved in my community; volunteering for nonprofits that helped disabled veterans and rescued shelter dogs. I was achieving my American dream, while working and volunteering to help many others realize their own American dreams. And it all came crashing down in an instant as my life changed on May 17, 2013, and had it not been for the ACA I would have died. The ACA made it possible for me to see my children graduate high school and head off to college.

I want to live to see them get married and have their own children. I want to live and have at least part of the life I worked so hard for all those years. I fear without the ACA I will not have a chance to see my own grand children. I fight tooth and nail every day to stay alive and fighting to survive this medical condition should be all I have to fight for right now because that is more than enough to fight for everyday. Without the ACA I fear I will have to fight to try and afford any medical care at all much less what I need to live. It is hard enough to stay strong and fight to stay alive for my family when I have access to good medical care.

I should not have to worry everyday that congress will vote to take away my access to affordable healthcare and my ability to fight to stay alive.

I should not have to worry that my family will be financially ruined just trying to keep me alive. That is not part of the American dream.

Sincerely, a voter and American dreamer,