Not the Energizer Bunny
Sunday, February 17, 2008 at 01:37AM I'm cheating. I'm taking a comment from somewhere else, expanding it a little and slapping it in here to assuage my guilt at not posting.
The crazy thing these days is that although I work only 3 - 4 days a week, I spend all of my off time either with people who are mangling my body (although they assure me they are 'fixing' me), in meetings with either VAC, GECA / WCB, SISIP / CFPAF, 2 different Doctors and Case Management, gathering information for the previous acronyms or writing letters, essays and life freakin' stories for said people.
Today, I'm at work. Early in the morning. After a night of corn chili and beers with T. Because, crazily, I spend most of my weekends with him, although I work weekends and he doesn't. For some reason, after spending so long with weekends mostly off, I end up with a returning best friend whom I can only see on the weekends. Life, my life, she is like that.
So, I'm tired and functioning only well enough to hit computer keys for the sick people who show up and I'm tired enough to feel more heartbroken than usual about some of them. Especially the woman who comes every morning for her test, right on time. Which is lovely, except she has yet to get the right day and it's not a test I can ask them to do early for her. So, she continues to come and one day, it will be the right day.
I'm so tired I went to the coffee place and the kid who gets my coffee was too tired to lift his head up off the cash register, so I joined him until we both had enough strength to carry on.
I find these days that I can only speak directly to people, face to face, and only to people I REALLY want to. It's almost all surface. And surface enough only to give me a way to amuse myself. Phones on my off time cause actual nausea. The thought of writing down anything to update anyone gives me nightmares after the weeks of filling out the same information in different ways on different forms for different government agencies, writing letters and telling my story over and over to different people, with no end in sight.
I found out at the end of January that the application for compensation and it's 800 associated pieces of painstakingly gathered information that spent the last YEAR -12 full months, people, and 20 full months since I was injured- was 'rejected' due to the fact that a) it was the wrong acronym and b) I slipped through a policy crack (big surprise there). Unfortunately, there was a correct acronym it should have gone to but the first acronym (although morally bound to inform me) felt it not in their best interest to tell me. I'm going out on a limb here and assuming that it's because I'd get more money and it would then cost them more money, especially considering that they are still not out and out rejecting but stringing me along in the hopes I'll either think it's too much work for their pissy little bit of cash and give up or keep plugging away and still end up with their little pissy bit of cash.
Hrm. $8,000. I doubt I'd give that up. Considering what I've lost over this. But, the correct acronym? Closer to $50,000. And that's only covering what I've lost. And, oh, that's an error that will be pursued until my dying breath. Baby.
Maybe a young reservist would let it go and I'm sure that's what they are going for but I, I am older and much more stubborn and have lost so much more money than most reservists (who typically are in university, live at home and are under 21). And I understand that persistence and patience will win the race.
I now have a case manager and not only are we backing up and restarting with the correct acronyms, finally, but we can add as well the complaint to the ombudsman in regards to the above non-information tactic and the letters I'll be writing to my local MLA after this entire ordeal is over.
I am, however, happy. Tired. But happy.
Not, thankfully, content.
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