[SoScorpio]

Actually, "worried" doesn't even begin to cover it. I'm full of dread over it, and I feel like just thinking about it is triggering my anxiety. I could barely sleep last night, and knowing that I had to be up at 7:20 to make sure she gets on the bus to work because she lost her phone, I woke when my boyfriend left at 6 and have been laying in bed since then worrying. Just now I passed her room and glanced in to see if she was up, she was sitting in her chair and just the way she looked up at me gave me a spike of fear.
First I should explain that she doesn't have a choice. She turned 26 two weeks ago and no longer has insurance from her mom. She is waiting to be approved for disability, and I think once she is she'll have access to cheaper care, Medicare or something, right? But she refilled her medication before losing the insurance, and none of us are sure if she can now pick it up without being billed for the full amount. In any case I'm not sure how much good it would do anyway, she's already been off it for a week and symptomatic, and after the 30 pills she'd just be out again anyway.

I feel scared and trapped. I can't even imagine what she's feeling. Already I can see the far-away look in her eyes, and the habitual grimace that I've come to associate with her hearing voices. Luckily she rarely experiences hallucinations or paranoia, or so she says. Just delusions and voices.
But I have plenty of reasons to be anxious. She's been in the mental hospital three times in the two years I've known her, all from quitting her medication. The first time was before she lived with us, and at the time I had no clue what was going on. Her symptoms looked more like severe depression and ADD than schizophrenia. But comparing it to the times I know she was off her meds, I'm now sure that's what it was. She had been self harming even before that, but I thought she had an abusive boyfriend she wouldn't talk about or something. When asked about the bruises she said she didn't know how she got them, which is one thing victims of abuse may say.
The second time she was in the hospital was terrifying for us. My boyfriend got home after dropping me off at work, to find our front door busted open and her gone. We couldn't get ahold of her, hours later her mom said the hospital called to tell her she had been admitted. Apparently our downstairs neighbor called in a domestic disturbance, when the cops came no one answered the door so they broke it down, and came in to find her banging her head against the floor repeatedly. For months after she came back, I worried what I would find when I came home every day.
The third time she was committed willingly because she had put off getting her meds refilled so long that the quickest way to get then was to be committed.
After that we resolved she was going to take her meds, come hell or high water. We spent at least six months reminding her to take them every night. Finally we convinced her to set a reminder on her phone, and that seemed to work. But then she stopped taking her Prozac. She'd done this before, and said she didn't think it was as important as the antipsychotic. We've explained many times that there's a reason she's prescribed both, and quitting an antidepressant can really mess you up. But I believe she's stopped taking them for the past couple months, this time because she says they get stuck in her throat. I don't see how, as they're the hollow capsules.

But around this time I started struggling with my seasonal depression, and reassured by her compliance on the olanzapine, I let my boyfriend take over on keeping an eye on her.

But now I can see it all coming back, and it feels like a recurring nightmare. Last night she left the living room right after I got home, which could be coincidence, or because she hears my voice in her head, and it takes the role of abuser and punisher. She has told me she sometimes hides things from me because she thinks my knowledge will make the me in her head even worse.

I'm just terrified of what's going to happen. Will she break more of my stuff, like the time she broke my pearl necklace and said it was a "break down" which I have always found suspicious because she did it directly after we said something that made her mad? Will we come home to a trashed apartment, a broken door? Or will she just not come home one day?
She may get fired. Her boss is aware of her condition, but as he does not receive benefits from her disability, and never will, he has no incentive to keep her around. Already she struggles at work, even on her pills her work pants get ridiculously dirty, and then she sleeps in them and doesn't do laundry but once a month, if that. Once her boss actually gave her $20 to buy new ones. If that happened to me I would have been too ashamed to even tell anyone, and I would have tried harder to keep the new pair nice. I don't think I need to tell you that's not what happened.
We depend on her for a third of the rent every month. We have let it slide before, after she was fired from the job where I met her. But we are already in a bad place now, paying off a car we totaled and riding the bus everywhere. We only live in a two bedroom because of her, we wouldn't be able to afford it by ourselves.

It might seem silly, but I worry she's going to break my AeroGarden. It's one of the most valuable things I own, and the most treasured, and it's in the bathroom because the living room is so cold, and the bathroom is where she goes to have breakdowns sometimes. It is actually therapy for me, the plants help me to dispel my winter depression. She loves plants too, I'm hoping that will be enough for her to spare them.

But I'm scared. I feel like my home isn't a safe place anymore, and my home is where I feel the best, the safest, the least depression and anxiety. I'm not scared of her being violent or actually hurting me, as she never has. I'm scared of the shadows her illness casts. I'm scared of the look on her face, the thoughts in her head. It might be different if she ever came to me for help, but she doesn't, so I don't even know what it's okay to say, I'm afraid anything I do will make her worse.

What do we do? Is there anything we can do?

[Sometimes psychotic]

What about obamacare? Shes required to have insurance or pay a fine anyway, why not get the insurance?

[SoScorpio]

We got something in the mail that said the deadline for this year was in December last year.
I have no idea how it works but what happens if she pays for obamacare and then gets approved for Medicare?

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[Loial]

I think it's still possible...

Friday deadline for Feb. 1 Obamacare coverage - The Morning Call

Although Friday is the deadline for people who want to be fully covered by the start of next month, enrollment for coverage starting later in the year will continue through Jan 31.

[Sometimes psychotic]

Originally Posted by SoScorpio

We got something in the mail that said the deadline for this year was in December last year.
I have no idea how it works but what happens if she pays for obamacare and then gets approved for Medicare?

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If she gets approved for medicare I think that she can stop paying/cancel obama care----there are special conditions for life changes including losing insurance that fall outside of the deadlines.

[junkDNA]

medicare wont usually come if u get on disability until 2 yrs after you receive your first disability check

[SoScorpio]

Originally Posted by junkDNA

medicare wont usually come if u get on disability until 2 yrs after you receive your first disability check

Really? That's crazy. It's not logical to assume that someone who needs supplemental income for a disability also needs frequent medical care and a way to pay for it, no, not at all.
This country is so backwards.

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