This rant may be completely pointless, but I need to get it off my chest. I’m probably one of the first people to admit that the medical system just isn’t what it used to be. We used to have better care for people with mental illnesses. Insurance premiums and co-payments used to be lower. People used to think twice before going to the ER for piddly little things. There was a time when it was easier (and less time consuming) to seek health care where one was supposed to seek it. That said, there are a few things that bug the hell out of me for seemingly no apparent reason while I’m at work, and those things are people on public aid, people with severe mental illness, detox patients, and people who make up stuff.
First, let me just say this this post is probably offensive to some, but I don’t care. These are my opinions and you can feel free to dislike them all you want. Just remember that I see a lot of negative things where I work, and although I’m generally a happy and caring person, I’m also very jaded and sad about the sorry state that our society is in because I see these particular situations so many times. So, without further ado:
People on Public Aid (Free Aid from the State)
I do not understand these situations. First of all these people have no money, which is why they are on public aid in the first place (not to be confused with people who pay to recieve their care from the state). This is not necessarily a bad thing because hey, everyone’s got to start somewhere. What bugs me to no end is that these people who have no money in the first place are reproducing like rabbits, having five or six kids while people who have money are only having one or two. I know that Public Aid is supposed to ease the financial stress for people who don’t have money, especially in the areas of social services and health care. What I don’t understand is this: Why are the poor people the ones who are having so many children? Why would they subject their offspring to a life of poverty, then make matters worse by having another child? Family planning places have free condoms and often it is easy to come by contraceptives, especially these days, so why? Is this due mainly to religious beliefs? Are people not getting the right sex ed? Is it in their culture?
Secondly, why do these people then turn around and treat the ER like it’s their primary doctor? We see it all the time: Whole families coming in to the ER for a cold or a low-grade fever or a headache, and saying, “well while we’re here I might as well get my other three kids checked out, too.” I’m sorry, but that bugs me! If I were to have four children, being a member of the working middle class, I wouldn’t qualify for aid from the state, so I’d probably have an insurance through my workplace (which also bugs me since half of the mothers on public aid do not work and come in with coach purses and nice manicures). If I took all four of my children into the ER, with co-payments as high as they are now, I’d spend around $600.00 just in co-pays to get my kids checked, and even then that doesn’t include anything they might charge percentages on, like tests. Then, because I took them to the ER for something that can clearly wait for the primary doctor to see, I just made people with more serious problems have to wait, because they put me and my four kids in a room that five minutes later could have been needed by someone with chest pain or shortness of breath. It’s amazing just how much quicker people would get in to see the doctors if we just denied public aid. So I think that people who have public aid should have co-pays just like everyone else for the ER. It would be ridiculous to make them as high as everyone else, but it might make them think twice before coming for something that they can wait to go see their doctor for.
Severe Mental Illness with Children
If someone has a severe and completely debilitating mental illness (not to be confused with mental deficiency or disability) I personally don’t think they should be allowed to reproduce. It’s not fair to them to have to try and deal with raising a child when they have trouble taking care of themselves properly, but most of all it’s unfair to the child to have to go through life with a parent who cannot care for them. In the end the cycle repeats itself, and we are left with a history of abused, mistreated, and otherwise neglected children who may have a genetic predisposition tending toward various mental illnesses. It’s just not fair to put a child through that. Now I’m not talking about parents who take the right steps to get their illness under control. I’m talking about people who cannot make the right choices because they do not have the capacity to. There’s a difference. We all develop mental quirks and some are harder to deal with than others. I get that we’re all humans, but we’ve all turned into these care-bear tree-hugging pacifists, and I’ll tell you, if it were any other species these kinds of deviants would have been weeded out long ago, left to die somewhere or just flat-out killed. It’s called survival of the fittest, and these people just aren’t making the cut. You want to fit into society? Well, shape up or not, but don’t have kids if you can’t take care of them. That’s like kicking society in the nuts after you take our money for behavioral health services.
Detox Patients
Most detox patients aren’t in the ER because they want to be. For those that are, I congratulate you on making a good decision to turn your life around, but the ER generally is not the place to do detox. There are specialized rehab facilities that are designed specifically for your condition. Don’t come to the ER, take up a bed for thirteen hours, then go home and do it all over again. It’s disrespectful to the rest of us who actually need treatment, and your sorry state–however sad your story is–is not “technically” a medical emergency (unless you have alcohol poisoning). Also, you’re probably wasted all the time if you’re a regular, so it’s reasonable to assume that any job you may have had before is now down the drain, because they wouldn’t put up with your intoxication/high/both any longer. I wish sometimes that drugs would just go away completely so that all the addicts in the world would detox against their will and realize how stupid they were. Also, please stop hitting on the staff/being belligerent/trying to get drugs. We don’t appreciate it, and we think you’re a tool.
Liars, Drama Queens and Attention Seekers
Often times these three things are all rolled into one. Someone will bring a person in because, “Oh my God he threatened to kill himself and he needs treatment right away so that I can rest easy knowing that he’s going to live to do something else that’s overly dramatic and completely unnecessary.” This is how it goes. I have a terrible urge when someone says that they want to kill themselves to just say, “prove it. Here, I’ll show you a few tricks,” and watch their eyes go wide because that was not the kind of attention they were seeking. If someone were really going to do it, they would just do it. They wouldn’t sit there telling everyone how much they want to do it, because that would just make people suspicious of them and they’d want the freedom to actually do it. And while we’re on the subject, people who are actually successful in self-termination are in my opinion probably doing society a favor. I’m not saying that they’re not useful or insightful or that they shouldn’t have lived or even that the people they left behind aren’t heartbroken, but in all reality and looking at things objectively, it’s nature playing out its grand design. Animals do it, and humans do too. It just means that they weren’t meant to handle the pressures that we rally against every day, and they realized that and decided to remove the weakest link.
People also tend to blow things way out of proportion. They will lie about the severity of their issues just to get seen quicker, perhaps not realizing that it’s completely and totally selfish of them to do so. Then these particular people raise a big stink when they’re not immediately cared for. Well, I have news for you. 95% of the time we can tell when you’re lying. What’s that? Your fever was 105 before you came? Well that wind must have been nice and cool, because you’re at 99.5 now. And your blood pressure was so high you thought you might explode? Don’t worry, it’s normal now. You think you might have H1N1 even though you have no symptoms? Sorry, but you can wait in line behind this baby that’s actually turning blue.
The bottom line is that these people should not reproduce. It’s not good for the child, the parent, or the human race. The world is overpopulated anyway. Don’t be a douche.
Jess
March 16, 2011 at 7:43 am
I find it interesting that you make a blanket statement regarding people with severe mental illness. You follow it with “not those with mental deficiency or disability.” However, some could argue that people who are mentally handicapped are not in a position to be able to adequately raise children.
How would you define “severe mental illness”? Bipolar disorder, schizophrenia? What about those that are being treated with therapy and medication? Plenty of people lead productive lives that have mental illness. Unfortunately, the stigma surrounding mental illness perpetuates the idea that everyone with mental illness are either violent or completely incapable of taking care of themselves. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder as a senior in high school. Since, I have had some depression episodes, but I have been stable for quite some time. I plan on having a child, and I am positive that I will be able to raise my child in an effective, loving, positive way. I have developed coping skills that allow me to notice my shifts in mood and get help preemptively.
I am also studying to get my MS in Clinical Mental Health Cousenling. Therefore, I am obviously sound enough in the mind to take care of a child and to help people in need.
I obviously accept your opinion and your right to free speech, but I just want to make you aware that blanket stereotypes are always dangerous to make.
Jess
Colleen
April 5, 2011 at 6:49 pm
@ Jess: I think that people with mental illnesses are perfectly capable of raising children, but they should be able to properly take care of themselves first. What I’m talking about is people who cannot take care of themselves turning around and having children. That’s not fair to the parent, and it’s certainly not fair to the child. I see it every day; children who come in because their parents neglected them for reasons that are beyond either of their control. If you are sound and able to have children, and you are certain that you are able to provide that child with the love/attention/care that he or she needs to grow up well-nurtured, then go for it.