the true costs of insurance

Ken and I are on our way back to Bandon. After a good week, I think we are getting pretty good at "being retired". We go over and practice in Eugene, then go back to "work" in Bandon.

We bought a cabinet on final clearance at Pier One imports and we are going to tile the top of it

and convert it into a sink cabinet. I will try to take pictures.

Its funny, but Ken and I have been renovating houses for years now, it was a joke back in Chilliwack that once the Bates had finished replacing the flooring in a house, it was a good sign that they were moving soon. Ken does some very fine woodworking, and I have done a lot of tiling and painting. It just always seems, if you do it yourself, you can get very creative.

We have not done much of this ( at least I have not) for the past 6 years. Writing songs, recording cds and then cancer therapy has kept me more than busy for all this time. It is so much fun now to have the time to just putter away with these little projects.

I have been feeling pretty good as well, well up until today. I decided a few days ago to try reintroducing some fiber back into my diet, as the gastroenterologist had suggested. Whole wheat bread a few times a day and just a few peas in a rice dish last night and everything came back today, the nausea and the colicky pain.

So it is clear that the small bowel is not able to deal with any fiber at all.

Zofran works very well for the nausea and the great thing is that it is now generic, so VERY cheap and it does not make you sleepy.

I changed a few things on my medical insurance policy this year, since I had to pay so much out of pocket last year, I decided to lower the deductable down to 500, from 7500. My monthly cost went from 350 a month for (just) medical and a high deductable, to 650 and month and a lower deductable. The amount my insurance paid out for me last year was about 100,000 dollars. I guess I was feeling kind of badly about that until I calculated how much our family has paid out in insurance monthly bills since we moved to the US. We have almost never used our insurance, being fairly healthy up until now

I calculated that we have paid 160,000 for health care in those years, and that if we keep paying what we are, it will cost another 120 thousand before we qualify for medicare.

It makes me wonder how many people ever use in medical expenses the amount they pay in premiums during the pre medicare years, ie 65 and under. At my current rate of premiums, that would be 507,000 per person for 65 years.

I have found though, that insurance is good company to be in.

Bye for now

love

Janet

jankenb @ gmail.com