Social (No) Services

Monday, October 4th 2010


Social Services! I was up at 6am, dressed, coffee on board. Around 8am I started feeling the anxiety. I took half a Xanax and got myself out the door before I could procrastinate.


First Stop: Special Response to sort out the eviction paperwork, report my SSD income change for October, and drop off the electric bills. My caseworker is unavailable. :-( The receptionist told me to come back tomorrow. I said, "Tuesday is his paperwork day." No, summer's over, Mondays are his paper days, which is why he's unavailable today.


This was my fourth time trying to get in to see him. The one day the wait was so long he didn't have time for me. The next day he wasn't in, come back Tuesday. I went back Tuesday and they told me it was his paper day. Now I go in Monday and it's his paper day. Sigh!


Next Stop: Food Stamps! I waited in the reception line for 45 minutes. When I got to the receptionist, I told her my Food Stamps hadn't credited. She didn't look surprised. She said simply, "It's the 1st of the month." I guess this happens quite a bit. I told her I saw the nice caseworker two weeks ago for my recert. She said the cranky lady is still my caseworker. Joy! :-/ Have a seat...


About a half hour later, the second receptionist called my name. I returned to the desk to be told I had to do a recert. The first receptionist quickly said, "No, no, no, no. She just did her recert two weeks ago. She (the caseworker) needs to find out why it didn't credit and get this lady her food stamps." I sat back down.


Shortly after, I was called to the desk again. The receptionist informed me that the cranky lady has put my recert on the supervisors desk, give it two days, then call the 800 number on the back of the card to verify it's been credited. She said if there's a problem, I can just call, I don't have to come all the way back in.


Third Stop: Medicaid office! Much nicer office, only one other person in there. The receptionist took my information and called upstairs. Soon I was heading for the second floor to meet another case worker. I sat at her desk. She verified my source of income as SSD. Then she asked what my benefit amount was. When I told her, she said I was not eligible for Medicaid, I was $300 over the cap.


I said, "So I have no medical benefits until February when I am eligible for Medicare?" She said yes. I said I was going to have to cancel my appoinhtments and come off my meds. Then she asked me if I could get an HMO. I gave her the financial run down - Income $1200, rent $913, electric $100, food, transportation...what's left? My med's alone are a few hundred a month, one of them is almost $300 on it's own. She told me about Walmart's $4 prescriptions, I told her one of my meds doesn't have a generic and is not on the list there. She gave me the phone number for Rx4NJ to try to get prescription help, and the OHI clinic so I can see a doctor. That's the clinic that I was going to for 2 years who couldn't handle my issues. They referred me all over the place, and I wasn't able to be seen for many of those referrals because charity care clinics are nearly impossible to get into.


Sigh. I am glad I started weaning off my med's on Friday. You cannot abruptly stop a few of them.