Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Reason number 1,552 why we need to get the fuck out of New York - it is IMPOSSIBLE to find a doctor when you need one, and then when you do, the doctor usually sucks.

Yesterday my OB diagnosed me with Postpartum Depression, and now I need to see a psychiatrist. The only psy she knows doesn't take insurance, so I need to find a psy that does. Easier said than done. I made 6 phone calls this morning and so far, no dice. Oh, there are plenty of doctors I could call who don't take insurance - because I live in NYC and I'm clearly rich, right? WTF?

When I was having problems breastfeeding, I was told to call a lactation consultant. Ok. They all charged 200 bucks an hour for a home visit, 150 for an office visit. That's an outragous amount of money to me. I'm a highly skilled professional and I only charge 50 to 60 bucks an hour. And I'm certainly not going to take my week-old baby out in the cold winter to save 50 bucks. So, we didn't do an LC, and she eats formula now.

Here's the thing about NYC: if you're rich, you get the medical help you need because you can pay for it. if you're poor, you get the medical help you need because the state pays for it. If you're middle class, you're screwed. Maybe that's also true of the rest of the country, I don't know. All I know is I have lived all over this country and I never had a problem with the medical community like I have had here.

And now it's time to take my baby to the one of two doctors we like here - our pediatrician.

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