Goings On!

Well I talked to the Insurance Adjustor yesterday. Her name is Jeanine and we've had one other occasion to talk about my car about 2 years ago. A Woodchuck chewed through my transmission line on that claim!

She remembered me and that claim because it was so odd.

She asked how it happened and I explained. She wanted to know how bad was it... and could I drive it? Apparently she has handled concrete vs vehicle claims where the underside of the car has been covered and the car is a total loss!

She concurred that my poor 'Ru had to see a professional for clean up and that it is covered under Comprehensive coverage.

The estimate for this? $2,500.

I think I am the lucky one. I'd had to think how the other car that splashed me turned out.

Jeanine said if another Very Strange Auto Claim came past her desk, the first thing she would do is to see if it belonged to me. She said she still refers to the Woodchuck Attack once in a while just for laughs.

Meanwhile...

The Wild Teddy Bears decided they better check out Frank's bulldozer.

I'm glad they couldn't figure out how to run it!
 

Hey Percy, let's check this out!

Chance, you do the pedals, 
I'll do the stick things...

This is so much cooler

than that bike!
Where should we go?

The work started yesterday. Frank cleaned out all the culverts and reshaped the waterways for run off. 

He graded the area by our back door and is putting in a gravel parking area.

I spoke with Frank and let him know that my neighbor probably had a small job for him to do before he was done at my place with the dozer. 

Frank thanked me for the referral. He was pleased as my new neighbor asked Frank to also grade and gravel his driveway too.

The final cost will be pretty pricey, however the lower driveway has seen one load of gravel in 26 years. The cost of maintaining the driveway all of these years has been very minimal. I want to have the whole thing done properly and hopefully it will last a long time.

Okay, the driveway rehab is pretty boring stuff. But I feel rather accomplished. This sort of job was always referred to Rich as he was the one who always negotiated these things. There were a lot of guys I could have called for this job, but I felt that the work should go to the fellow that was maintaining my driveway through the winter too.

Crisis? What Crisis?

I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine who lives in the southern part of the US. [She lives alone with her 3 dogs. It was her love of her Dachshunds that actually brought us together.] 

What price do we pay in becoming elderly? What price did the Pandemic take on those folks who have health issues and have taken precautions since March 2020? 

If being elderly wasn't bad before hand, it certainly is more so now. Isolation is one part. Older people are shunned by younger folks. I was as guilty as the next guy. 

I started to understand how difficult it is for some to age in place when my MIL started to fail at recalling things and moving around. Her issues were mostly invisible until she had a fall.

I realized that my husband would not be able to be on his own if I were not here to take care of him. It is a sobering thought. If something happened to me, what would happen next? [Working on that.]

My friend in the south has no one. Her husband is gone, her son is gone, and her cousins she was close with are now gone too. She lives on her own and has dealt well with her health issues and is trying to keep up with life. She has no advocate to help her deal with working around her medical issues.

She has no one to help her deal with her insurance plan either. Sometimes the effort to work around the ins and outs of a medical plan is confusing and difficult. Reading an insurance plan is as clear as mud. 

Years ago, I thought I'd start a private business in just helping others with their insurance billings and resolving issues. What I discovered was dealing with my husband's health was a full time job. It taught me a lot about dealing with doctors, getting approvals, and dealing with medical billings.

Thank goodness I had a degree in Medical Billing and Coding [it is obsolete now since so many things have changed, however it gave me insight as to the difficulties doctors and clinics face too].

I would love to see insurance simplified, but I don't have the answers.

So how is a person who has an insurance plan from the state of Massachusetts get coverage in the southern US? The words 'out of network' pop up. What does that means to the patient? How can that patient find out? 

How does that person make an appointment in their local area to get treated for a pressing issue? Do they put it off because it is too complicated to get an answer? If they do, does that make their risk of a fall or risk of living independently so much worse? Where do they go for help?

I've found good help in working with ADRC who directed me to the county social worker for my MIL. That started the ball rolling that eventually helped with issues she had. I couldn't deal with all of her care at the time and deal with the care my husband needed too. 

My brother was extremely active in caring and assisting my father as he aged and did an incredible job at being his caregiver. 

People need advocates. Caregivers need breaks or they suffer horribly. Compassion Fatigue is real. 

Yet there is no obvious help unless a person digs for it.

Elder care is exhaustive and difficult. Here is long, but very good article here at Vox. The subject is not a popular subject and the discussion surrounding elderly care is an uncomfortable one for many people. 

So when my southern friend stopped talking to me on Sunday...and I could hear her crying I felt totally helpless. My heart strings broke. I was her weekly contact. She was lonely, she was

lonely...

And I could not fix it.

I did get her laughing before we signed off on our phone call and I asked her to please find out where the nearest senior center was to at least go and find some company. 

No person should suffer that loneliness. 

This crisis is growing. And I have no idea of how to fix it.

I've been told that I 'was' so 'lucky' to be able to quit work and stay home to care for my husband. 

Hmmm. But my thoughts on that are for another day.

Let us not forget how to care....