Health Insurance

When I quit my job, I received individual health insurance from Blue Cross/Blue Shield. All was well until a few months later when BCBS started to "investigate" my application.

Several months into being covered, they decided to retro-decline my application due to the fertility treatments that I had in the past. I argued with them, filed a grievance, argued with my doctor to give them additional information about the fertility treatments and my health (which is great), but it was all for nothing. They still declined me. The "funny" thing is that when I received a check from them returning the monthly payments I had made less any money they had spent on covering me, it turned out that I had paid about $1,000 for the coverage for several months and they had paid $50 for me. Ridiculous. I don't know why BCBS can't figure out that it's worth their bottom line to cover me because theywere making a killing off of me when I was signed up.

Then I tried to sign up with two other insurance companies and they both declined me due to the fact that I had already been declined by one and because of the fertility treatments. This all seemed very unreasonable. Although - don't get me wrong - I had no notion that health insurance companies are reasonable.

So, then I called an independent health insurance agent, whom Michael had used when he signed up for individual health insurance, and explained what had happened and told him that I was seeking health insurance of any kind, whether that be temporary or high risk or whatever. My thought was that I needed to be covered while we got this all straightened out. Meaning, until I was able to find another job and forget about massage therapy - at least for now - so that I could get health coverage.

What I didn't expect to hear from the agent, and what none of the other health insurance companies I had applied to had told me, was that if you have a pending adoption, you cannot change individual health insurance coverage (which includes gaining coverage for individuals) until the adoption is complete and the baby has been given a clean bill of health. I was completely blindsided. No one had ever told us about this and I've never read about it in any the many, many adoption websites and information hubs that I subscribe to. I didn't, and still don't, understand what my receiving health insurance has anything to do with the adoption. I, of course, pushed him for a greater explanation to which he just answered that I should check out more information about it on the TX Department of Insurance's website and then I should write letters to my state reps. If I had known that I would categorically be denied individual health insurance coverage due to our pending adoption, I definitely would have done things differently.

This health insurance deal is truly a stressful mess for us. Considering that I'm completely healthy and still having this many problems getting insured, at whatever cost, I'm looking forward to the industry being overhauled and regulated by the feds. Viva Obama!