I’m not in the mood for writing. I finally trundled over to the vampire clinic, starving from over 14 hours of fasting (I kind of miscalculated the time To stop eating). This was a triumph. It took only six *cough* months and a few reminders from my neurodoc to get meself to the blood lab so that my GP can monitor my glucose, lipids, and Vitamin D.
But you know what it’s like. First, winter. Who wants to schlep through the cold and snow to shed layers so that your elbow can be jabbed. And then there’s the whole cold and flu thing. Then, well, I’m off on vacation. No way getting pricked before and after. Gotta save up my energy. Then there’s the whole I-hate-needles thing and the pain . . . Ouch! Although I must admit that never stopped me going before 2013. I just complained, dragged my mother along, and went. Finally, I just forgot.
But eventually, my neurodoc got me emotionally stable enough for me to endure the test because at the end of the day, the real reason I wasn’t going was I have too many things on my plate, too many emotions waking up and swirling like tornadoes in my head, too many memories of going to too many medical appointments alone having to advocate for myself alone, that I couldn’t tolerate one more thing. And overcoming my brain-injury-induced initiation deficit was beyond me even for the cause of better health, the one driver normally stronger than my deficit.
I guess this is living with PTSD, where even a simple battery of tubes sucking your blood out is too much.
But the advocacy never ends. I had to get my Vitamin D tested. It was too high last time. My father had told me OHIP will cover the test in that case. Oh. You mean, I don’t have to pay $50 for an important, preventative-medicine test under our free medicare system? Nope. You just need the code.
I asked my GP’s office. They thought it was free. Um, no. My GP didn’t know the code. My neurodoc didn’t know it offhand. Since I’d run out of time and knew if I didn’t go on the early morning I’d decided on — and of course I made all these calls last minute — it’d be months before I tried again.
So in I went to the blood lab and asked about this free Vitamin D test. They looked at my lab requisition form and said, well, first off this requisition has expired. Yes, folks, I had stalled too long. Oops.
Thanking the gods I have an iPhone and don’t have to hunt for a payphone or beg to use a phone anymore, I prayed my GP’s office was open. It was. His very sleepy-sounding secretary answered, and she, the wonderful woman that she is, faxed a new form to the lab with the magic words on it — “Vitamin D insured.”
Insured.
That’s the code to getting this important test covered by OHIP. Now my docs will know. And I await my test results . . . well, assuming I hurdle my next internal barrier, seeing my GP to hear what my blood has to tell.
