The Spector of Health Insurance Raises Its Ugly Head

Here we are, me with my paint brushes, Jim with his camera and Mat with his school books. Above us is an ugly monster called health insurance, which is threatening to bleed us dry.

Long ago, I went back to school to become an art teacher for two reasons. One was a steady income. The other was health insurance. As it turns out, I loved teaching art. The pay check and insurance were a bonus.

When I decided to become a self employed artist a year and a half ago, we signed up for COBRA, which extended our health insurance for 18 months. Seemed like forever at the time. COBRA is a very expensive interim health insurance policy. For us, it was costing close to $900 per month. A lot of money.

The 18 months flew by. Some time ago, we started investigating individual policies, since we are self-employed. Guess what. We got a big fat DENIED from every policy we applied for. The good news is that the state has what's called a portability law, which means some insurance company is forced to cover you even if they don't want to, once you've been denied.

So we applied for a portability policy, figuring that it would, of course, cost more than what we are currently paying. Guess what the estimate for the three of us was? No, your guess was too low. In order to continue with insurance which would cover what our current insurance covers, our monthly payment would be $2800!!! Now does that sound like a great option?

We are mulling over the situation, and have several different companies doing research for us. Too bad the government can't get it together. Of course, we are only one of countless people facing the same problem.

Yes, going back to teaching would be an option. Not one I'm entertaining at the moment. Not that there are any jobs out there.