I have been listening to Hozier's "Take Me to Church," which is still popular but not a new song. It is a powerful commentary on institutional hypocrisy, specifically on the Xtian church and their stance on LGBTQIA rights, according to some interviews with the artist.
The spirit of the song can apply to so many things. The hypocrisy of big institutions against the citizens they are sworn to serve and protect but oppress mercilessly.
I crawled to my altar today, after too many days of pancreatic pain rendering me drunk and despondent, nearly beyond tears. It is hard to believe in anything when I feel so alone, so forsaken by so much. But I know better. I know the cause of my current situation, and the path out. It will not be easy, but it is for me to do. It is the lesson of this pain, a divine calling I hear as clearly as I see the morning sun.
Tomorrow, I will be back to calling the feds for the help that I and every disabled American in my position deserves, and not just the roughly 20 million people who suffer from Sphincter of Oddi Dysfunction. Yes. I need my meds, NOW.
This time, there is one thing I also know. I have to fight for reform, an end to this brutal practice of summarily refusing to pay (or discontinue) vital meds for sick, disabled, and dying patients. It needs to be illegal.
There also needs to be massive reform in healthcare and drug regulation so that no drug can have a price range of $1,200 to $33,000 a month, the prices I was quoted for the med I need right now. This is a brutality that is beneath the dignity of the most powerful nation in the world. This is no example. This is killing people, the most vulnerable of our citizens.
Human beings have an inherent right to healthcare and the medications that support life. These need to be accessible to everyone. We can do it. Our bloated defense budget and congressional salaries are good indicators.
So this week, I'm going beyond Medicare. Let's see if unmitigated suffering passes for business as usual in the Biden-Harris administration. Pain kills, and I won't go down without a fight or let them keep yanking my meds at will. NO ONE can survive pancreatic pain with no help. We need reform now. The feds put me here. This is not a pancreatic flare. It is not natural.
This is created suffering and abject institutional cruelty, at minimum. If they do nothing, it is the height of hypocrisy. If they do nothing, it is the brazen stupidity of the healthy, wealthy one-percent, the hubris of big-pharma, more interested in their bottom line than the lives they will destroy and the government with whom they are in bed. I won't stop until this does, or I die. Then, someone else will keep fighting. There is always someone else who will. They will never get away will complicit murder and that is exactly what this is.
