This Is Personal

I met a woman this week, slightly younger than me and so still of working age. Except, she can't work. She was a registered nurse until seven years ago, when she broke her back.
It wasn't until she told her doctor that she couldn't afford to come back that the doctor finally told her she'd probably never be able to work again.
She finally qualified for disability, which takes about two years. And she's still not healed, the result, they tell her, of a return of old, very traumatic memories from her youth, which have caused PTSD.
She is crippled and in pain. She lives in subsidized housing and she does not have a car. And she can no longer afford to see the providers who may have helped her because every time she visits, she gets a co-pay she can't afford. Because — this is the hard part — she receives $2 too much a month to qualify for Medicaid.
The Senate Health Care Reform bill would put her under the Medicaid umbrella.
So she could see the PTSD expert again and maybe complete her healing.
I doubt she's political. I doubt she knows how close she is to hope.
There are millions like her.