#ash throws a bitchfest

[cringeghostking]

and when is dear old joanne gonna be done kicking the shit outta people like me, huh?

[cringeghostking]

anyways,

[cringeghostking]

it all really is just you and a cat vs The Horrors

[cringeghostking]

🎶 tis the season to rant abt insurance ✨✨🎶

u ever have to pay $2K in prescriptions alone just to keep existing unless u find a health insurance plan u can convince that, No, Really, that brand name specialty drug is necessary for survival actually :)

like for some reason the deductible on my current health insurance plan is, almost exactly:

TEN TIMES MORE

this year than it was last year?? for reasons unfathomable to me and the way the policy is written, on paper it doesnt cover Anything until that deductible is met, but in practice last year it randomly covered a lot of shit even tho i hadn’t met the deductible yet?? and like, after the deductible is met everything is free. everything. everything.

but last year that meant that i would have the luxury of virtually free healthcare after like! two weeks! this year??? i would potentially be paying a minimum of $2,000/mo in prescriptions alone for like! idk, two months?? three?? and i cant! fucking do that???

like idk first the IRS was convinced i was lying abt my income and then the plan i was originally quoted suddenly?????? went from “you will pay $0.00/mo for the privilege of healthcare and your deductible will be $550 and then we gotchu bro no worries <3″ to “psych what if we charge you $70/mo and when you pay $4,500 out ur ass to keep living on this lumpy space rock we might cough up a lil somethin somethin for ya” like. i have 6 days to figure this out at this point and im terrified the script that has absolutely changed my entire life, the one that took two years to be approved, just...won’t be approved on any other plan if i switch over to something more fucking reasonable! bc insurance companies hate neurodivergents everywhere!!

[cringeghostking]

cw: long-ass COVID rant, ft. a real shit eugenics-y quote. bc it’s all finally Got To Me.

so. parents gave me COVID 2 days before i got vaxxed w the bivalent booster + the flu shot + i didn’t know bc i started feeling the symptoms exactly…2 hours after i got jabbed 🫠

and honestly? and im…im SO upset. i cried. i will probably cry more, for awhile.

i try so hard to be careful. i’ve let go of so many things i desperately wanted to do or would have tried to make happen if we lived in a world that, if it weren’t pandemic-free, at least fucking tried to respect Other People, because “personal responsibility” or whatever the fuck will never be enough.

i had the chance to visit one of my dear friends, and simultaneously to see a play that as far as we knew was a limited-run adaptation of a book i hold very, very dear. i had everything in order. and then the 2021 summer wave of COVID hit and i just…wouldn’t risk it. i didn’t get a refund on my flight because the airline claimed to no longer provide COVID-related refunds.

i had the chance to see one of my favorite bands live in concert. the concert required proof of vaccination and/or a negative test. i masked. i left the event early. and i still caught the delta variant, perhaps at the concert, perhaps at an airport. and since then? i don’t do much of anything i want to.

my friends around the country want me to visit them. i go to the ones i can afford to drive to, sometimes—and so i haven’t seen most of them since 2020 or before.

and im just. really really hurt honestly that everything i tried to do and everything i wanted to do and didn’t wasnt enough, that i still got sick bc my own parents can only half-ass caring, because, in my father’s words, “some people will just die and the world can’t stop for them.”

being infected with delta is still fucking with my lungs. i used to, and enjoyed!!! walking for 2+ miles daily. i was a swimmer with a decade of swim team behind me; i would swim laps decently, if not at the level i was as a teenager (which lmao wasnt anything special, despite the history, i promise), without Perishing.

i tried to swim a few weeks ago for the first time since COVID. it was like drowning; for days afterward, i couldn’t breathe properly. mentally, it felt like crossing off something i used to love: “guess i can’t do that again—for now, i hope”

i cant walk and talk at the same time now; pacing circles in my living room on the phone leaves me gasping awkwardly between words in short sentences. my friends used to ask if i was alright; now i suppose they’ve adjusted, too. walking and talking through a mask is near-impossible; ask me if i’m going to bitch about it. i went from “i’m not the peak of physical health, but i can function about the way you’d expect,” to “i’m using this grocery cart like a funky little walker because i’m Having A Time Of It getting to the goddamn bread isle”

it’s shit!!!! it’s such fucking shit and i didn’t WANT this again and i dont want anyone else to have it!!!! other people have had lasting symptoms SO much worse than mine and i can’t fathom shrugging this off when it’s the worst fucking roulette wheel!!!

god, i want this to be over, too. i want to visit my friends, i want to see the book i love adapted to its award-winning play, i want to go to fucking graduate school and sit in classes and not be terrified that the majority of the class isn’t wearing masks and someone in here is sick because of a shit sick policy! i want to go to live events and not weigh the cost of whether it might earn me a 3rd infection, and what that might do to me long-term!! i’m so sick of sitting in my house with my cats and my silly little internet connection!!!!

im so tired of letting things go that i would so desperately look forward to

anyway, if you read this far…wear a fucking mask, at least. please. tightly-sealed n95s are ideal, but if you look into it? literally any mask reduces the chances of infection DRAMATICALLY if all parties are masking.

[cringeghostking]

wow wish stuff were easier yk