Category Archives: Health Care

You don’t need to have Covid in order to have brain fog…..

It’s been a very long time since I’ve posted to this blog. The reason: brain fog. No, I haven’t had Covid. I quarantined for many months like everyone else. I got my vaccinations when available in March 2021. I wore a mask when I went grocery shopping. I did everything we were asked to do. So why do I have brain fog?

The simple answer (I think) is not doing much of anything. Months of solitude, no matter how many Zoom meetings I attended, Facebook posts I made, jigsaw puzzles I worked, new food dishes I tried, books I read, Internet rabbit holes I went down, the only time I could bring something enigmatic to mind was when I was supposed to be sleeping.

Laying awake at night when I couldn’t fall asleep, I could think of a thousand things to say, hundreds of mysteries to be solved, a bucket list to be proud of, but when I finally lifted my weary head off the pillow, my mind was a blank.

Mental machinations at night are just not the same as having an active mind during the day. The mind needs to be challenged. Even though everything I did during the day could be considered a learning experience, there is a difference between absorbing knowledge and having to think on your feet in something as simple as a conversation with friends.

Interpersonal relationships, I discovered, are what keep the mind sharp. A large part of a child’s development is having those interpersonal relationships which is why parents are so adamant about having their children back in school. I only needed to isolate myself for this past year to understand that. Interactions with other people, with what they say and what they do, are what challenge the mind and keep it sharp. They force one to think on their feet, to react at a moment’s notice, to make life and death decisions. Reading books or surfing the Internet fills a mind with information, but without a way to use it, the mind dies a slow death.

As I again find myself visiting with friends, volunteering, meeting and conversing with other people, I find my brain springing back to life. It’s not nearly where it was pre-Covid, but it’s a lot better than it’s been for the past year and a half. As proof, I was finally able to sit down and type out a blog post. I finally had something to say that will hopefully help others if they start to experience brain fog without having Covid.

Why health insurance is so expensive in America.

Today I had to call my health insurance carrier to get an explanation on a statement I received from one of my providers.  I had already talked to the provider and was told the problem was with my insurer.  Between the two, I finally discovered why health insurance is so expensive in America.

It all began with a charge of $114.00 for what I was told was a deductible. I really can’t tell you exactly why I have to pay that amount because, after spending nearly 30 minutes on the phone with customer service, I still don’t understand why I am being billed for this amount.

health insuranceAnd therein lies the answer to why health insurance in America is so expensive. Between a billing system that is more confusing than a Rubik’s Cube, a system of what’s covered and what isn’t covered that isn’t understood by any customer service rep I’ve ever spoken to, and providers to include doctors and facilities with no sense of what is meant by fair and just compensation, the entire healthcare system, including health insurance, is quite simply a conspiracy to bilk each and everyone of us out of billions and billions of dollars each year. Confound and confuse is obviously their modus operendi. Why else can you never receive a straight answer. Even worse, are the conflicting answers often proffered.

A health insurance policy should be able to be understood by the lowest common denominator.  By confusing and confounding us, our health insurance system collects more than their fair share from all of us with impunity. We ask no questions because we don’t know what to ask. And when we do ask — well, we might as well be listening to a politician orate. They say a lot but tell us nothing.

It’s no wander that we have become apathetic over health care and health insurance. But this is also the reason the entire system has burgeoned out of control. We have allowed it to happen, and that’s exactly what the system is counting on in the future. Their financial well being depends on it.