The Usual Complaints About America

I know it’s trite to say at this point but, it’s 🤬expensive to be sick in the US.

A rant:

So, I used all my PTO dealing with BPD at the end of a 10 year relationship.

Triggering is rare, but when triggered BPD* can feel like the conditioning scene of A Clockwork Orange, featuring a mental montage of all one’s greatest fears paraded where you can’t look away. Bodily, I feel poisoned. Most wellness/coping skills** fail at this level of disregulation.

Naturally this isn’t conducive to doing much of anything other than trying very hard to be unconscious as often as possible.

So, once my PTO and unpaid PTO were gone, I got the official warning + HR meeting. Which means an entire department now knows you’re a fucking POS.

I’m offered OFLA (I’m a month under qualifying for FMLA, which I catch the HR rep calling the “Friday Monday Leave Act” when talking on autopilot), and learn that while it can keep you from being fired, it means nothing in the way of pay. If you’re out of PTO, you’re out. It just means you can keep going sans pay and not yknow, sans job.

- CUT TO - I’ve been approved for OFLA 🙌🏻 which means I can’t be fired for needing time off to break down or to go to treatment. Plus my boss is the most understanding and supportive human and I can’t let that go unsaid.

So, what does treatment look like?

For intensive outpatient, which is suggested for non-suicidal crisis cases, it means *at least* 3 weeks of group appointments 3-5 days a week, 3 hours a day, plus an additional 1-2 hours 1:1 therapy. That’s the baseline to be effective, not including intake and Rx appts.

This means that only those who have ample PTO -and- have managed it well can get effective outpatient crisis treatment without losing too much paycheck money. No one comes out in the clear, especially if you’re on the 8-12 week track (more standard).

With or without OFLA, given how many PTO days are on offer up against the number of days required for effective treatment, I feel it’s only slightly hyperbolic to feel that my breakup could have very easily been paired with joblessness and, consequently, homelessness had my parents not been there to help me financially. Workplace and healthcare structures in the states aren’t built to accommodate effective crisis treatment, individually or transversely.

Thanks America.

*At least my triggered response.
**And my fortifying wall of 90mg of Duloxetine.