Insurance and Physical Therapy

My insurance very kindly (insert heavy sarcasm) approved me for four whole physical therapy sessions.

Isn’t that grand? (Yes, Alyssa, I STILL hate that word, I’m being snarky here and so…it fits.)

If you’ve done any sort of research on lymphedema (obviously, at this point, I HAVE done just a little research) you know that it’s not something that is cured. Once you have it, you’ll always have it.

Joy.

So, four whole PT sessions are probably not going to make a huge dent in my potentially gigantic left arm.

Okay. Yes, four sessions are better than none.

I will learn as much from these sessions as I can and try to control the lymphedema at home with exercise (Ha! Hahahahaha.) and gentle massage.

Please believe me when I say that I will be administering said gentle massage myself. I will not be asking my husband to massage my stupid arm. My arms are gross. I don’t want him to touch them.

It was bad enough when the poor fellow had to cram gauze into my boob incision. Imma pass on him massaging my flabby, fish-belly white arms.

I do realize how vain I sound. Whatever. I own it. I’m vain. I haven’t worn a tank top in public since 1995 because I hate my arms. Yes. That’s true, not even a little bit of exaggeration.

I may be the queen of hyperbole, but this time, it’s not needed. It has literally been 24 years since I wore a tank top in public. A swim suit at the pool or lake does not count because honestly, wearing a stupid T-shirt over your swimsuit just emphasizes your fatness. No offense to anyone who does wear a T=shirt, just sharing how I feel about it when it comes to MY body. So...yeah.

I just don’t want to be that woman at Walmart waltzing around with my giant blubbery arms hanging from my grody shoulders without some sort of sleeve covering the dimpled flesh.

So.

Four sessions of PT.

What the hell is wrong with our health care system?

I know. So many things, right?

Why do insurance companies get to decide what kind of and how much treatment a person gets? Shouldn’t that be up to the doctors, the patient, the therapists?

I’m preaching to the choir here, I get that. But it just makes me crazy to think that some bureaucrat out there is deciding that my arm (my stupid, stupid arm) needs four therapy sessions.

Yeah…we’ll see.