Jumping Through Hoops

Waking up to a cloudless, sunshiny sky when I was expecting snow or at least some sort of depressing overcast nonsense had me up and ready to head out the door in record time. Why hang around home when you can go shopping for stuff you're not going to buy?

First though my husband needed to call the guy at the medical supply shop. B's been trying to get a new push wheelchair since....I don't know. Like October or November. Go dig back in my archives if you really want to know because I'm sure I mentioned it when we first started the process. Here's how the process goes. Mr. Medical Supply comes over and finds a push wheelchair that will suit B's needs - in other words one that will comfortably accommodate his 6'4" long body and will fold up so I don't have a big ass wheelchair cluttering up our flat. I already have one of those, thanks, and don't need another. Then B gets a prescription for the wheelchair from the doctor, gives it to Mr. Medical Supply who then gives it to the insurance company with some paperwork. The insurance company says yes or no or asks for more information, Mr. Medical Supply gives it to them, they approve it, chair is ordered, delivered and the old push wheelchair we have that's currently in my way because it's so ancient it will no longer fold up is taken away. I get that there's going to be lag time but shit fire, we're halfway through February now. I sent the prescription to Mr. Medical Supply long ago - I think it was even before the Christmas market opened. We waited for a couple weeks and then B called Mr. Medical Supply to ask for an update. He asked how old B's current push chair is because the insurance company asked why B needed this specific wheelchair and how old his current one was. B told Mr. Medical that he'd had the push chair since around 1991 or 1992. And then we waited. We waited over Christmas and we waited over January and when we were staring down the middle of February B decided to call Mr. Medical again.

B called him last Monday. Mr. Medical said he needed to check his paperwork and would call back during the week. After no return call B called him again yesterday. Mr. Medical said he'd call between 5pm and 6pm. No call again and B called him back this morning. Mr. Medical apologized and admitted that the paperwork for this situation had been neglected but he'd heard from the insurance company and they wanted to know why B needed this specific chair and needed to know how old B's current push chair was.

Excuse me. Did I just get sucked back into time ten weeks?

B gave him the information again and Mr. Medical assured B that he'd call back during the week. I hung up the phone and went berserk. That lying SOB! Acting like he'd just heard from the insurance company and hadn't already asked B these questions. This guy has completely ignored this and I reckon if we hadn't called the paperwork would have sat on his desk until the end of time. It pisses me off no end how handicapped people are treated as if they're too stupid to know that they're being dicked around and that they're too timid to speak up for themselves and it pisses me off no end that people can't do their jobs properly. You sell medical equipment. Wouldn't you be better paid if you...oh I don't know...maybe sold some effing medical equipment to someone who's asking for it?

My idea for handling the situation was to go over Mr. Medical Supply's head and get his supervisor involved or me simply shoving my size 7 shoe up his ass. B's idea is to tell Mr. Medical Supply that B will contact the insurance company directly because if he talks to them they'll want to know why Mr. Medical hasn't already resolved this and will contact the manager thereby getting Mr. Medical's ass in a sling in a way that can't be ignored.

So then I went out into the sunshiny day and bought some white and purple tulips to celebrate the impending ass kicking of Mr. Medical Supply.