Well.

It passed.

The amoral, atrocious, vindictive, abomination of a bill passed the house today. The more I read about it, the more I am horrified. Truly horrified. The media has been focusing on the pre-existing conditions clause, but what has made my soul ache is the complete destruction of Medicaid and the loss of $880 billion in funding. $880 billion. The fact that every single medical society, every single healthcare advocacy group decried it should have meant that they considered the ramifications and had a thoughtful, careful approach to it. But I overestimated their moral conscience.

I’m enflamed and outraged. I am also terribly depressed and worried. I’m not comforted by knowing that it has to go through the Senate, as everybody keeps saying. All this revealed is how much our voices are ignored. I hope that this really does bring change at the midterm elections – but it didn’t when the republicans shut down the government for weeks so I don’t know why this would be different.

A few years ago, I was really into politics – I read about how the Supreme Court worked, I followed different bills and lawsuits, etc. A colleague of mine suggested getting involved in the AAN (American Academy of Neurology), as they have some political leadership courses and I could get involved in advocacy. And 4 months into this presidency and all of those kinds of thoughts have vanished. I’m tired and the thought of getting involved more… I hear that this has encouraged many people of the democratic party to seek office, and boy do I wish them well, and sort of wish it was me, mixed with gratitude that it’s not.