Monday, July 7, 2008

Stay home vs working

I read somewhere recently that the roles of husbands/wives is getting blurred. I don't necessarily disagree with that, but I find myself with a very emotional response.

In my deepest heart of hearts, I want to be a stay at home mom. I LIVE for all my school breaks so I can enjoy being at home with M.

Financially, we could survive on H's income.

But there is one catch.

We need insurance. We can't live without health insurance. H is self-employed. I'm a state employee. Guess who has affordable health insurance?

If I quit my job and we were forced to live on H's income, the cost of private health insurance would make that impossible.

So, are the lines blurred because we need health insurance? I don't know.

Kyla, over at The Journey, has written many, many posts about the state of health insurance in our country. Perhaps if policies change or options become available for families like ours, then I can stay at home. For now, I am responsible for providing health insurance for my family.

6 comments:

Kyla said...

That is a tough decision, and it isn't one that the insurance companies shouldn't be making for your family or anyone else's...but they are unfortunately. It is a shame that the system works that way, but there are so many families where one person works solely to qualify for insurance coverage. I hope something changes soon.

For the life of me, I can't understand why our country can't see that access to proper health care is a right, not a privilege. It is even MORE basic than an education, and yet, as a society we are fine with a government provided education, but draw the line at providing necessary treatment to people? You don't hear anyone saying "socialized education", right? But "socialized medicine" that's something to get people in arms about. I think a lot of it is fear mongering on a really basic level, sadly.

I'm stepping off my soapbox now. This stuff just gets me.

cherish.photography said...

I am so with you. I would love to be a SHM. I am working toward coming up with some ideas on how I can do that. Life is so short and my heart tells me it will be worth it.

Arizaphale said...

The situation in the US seems appalling to us. The UK has a totally public health system which has a down side in that you do not get 'choice'. Australia has a mixed system. You can get Insurance which will allow you to go private if you want to, or you can go public in an emergency. We dropped our insurance after we got married as it was breaking us and provided practically nothing we used. When the Small Boy had appendicitis he was taken in under public emergency health care anyway and we got nothing out of our expensive insurance >:-(
It sucks that your lifestyle has to be dictated by something which does not even cross people's radars in other countries.

Christina said...

It really is wrong that health care is so rediculously expensive. Our family of three is one three different insurance plans. And none of them provide very good coverage. Due to my heart condition, I could never afford insurance if not for my inlaws helping with ut. It's sad that something as basic as health care control our lives and our finances so much.

If you really do want to stay home...have you looked into companies like Unicare? That's what N has, and while their plans aren't great, it is affordable.

Andi said...

Nat,
I know this is a tough situation for you...I just pray that you figure something out. It never occured to me how precarious of a situation it can be until the daughter almost lost coverage, and until the husband's many health issues over the last few years. We could have NEVER afforded all of those surgeries and after care on our own.
You are probably faced with this situation at this time of the year every single year, now that school is so close again...I hope you are able to figure out a working solution!

Anonymous said...

This is a subject near and dear to my heart. I, too, am working full-time for the health insurance whereas I could probably get away with working part-time if only...

On the other hand, I agree with everyone's comments about how our health care system is a mess, BUT on the flip side, my husband is in school to be a doctor. We are quickly going into debt up to our eyeballs which will leave us with a total of $240,000 debt by the time he finishes med school. If the government does take over healthcare, doctors, nurses, and all healthcare professionals will take huge pay cuts. We may NEVER get out of debt if that happens which means my stay at home dreams won't come true.

Hang in there. I don't know what the right answer is for all of this, but I'm sure things will work out. I've heard the states health coverage is awesome! Definitely something you'll want to have to cover your maternity. It's not fun paying out of pocket... been there, done that... it stinks... thank goodness for payment plans!