I'm pretty sure that when 'Ol Alex Bell labored over his new invention that he actually intended for us to use it by actually reaching the person we called. None of this press 1 for English or I'm sorry I didn't understand  please repeat your response. 
 Now normally, as many of you who know me personally can attest, I have no stomach for waiting on hold. However, I must endure this madness in order to actually get to a real-life person. I cannot afford to leave this matter in the hands of a recorded voice.( who by the by might be more soothing if it sounded like Majel Barrett-Roddenberry for Star Trek's Star Fleet computer system)
I simply must reach someone who at one point in their life had an umbilical cord, not silicon chips. 

For months now I have been wading through a stack of medical bills that at last count was in totalling in the region of $28,000. After each new statement I then have to call the billing department to negotiate a waiver for the services I am being billed for. I am still stuck in Virginia and while I do have a job, it has recently been reduced from a full time to part time position. Which in no way helps that fact that I fell ill in March.

This bloody elevator music is driving me stark raving mad!!! Why couldn't it be something more uplifting and upbeat? OR AT THE VERY LEAST MORE THAN ONE SONG OVER AND OVER!! I've been on hold for 15 minutes already 

I've always known that I wasn't getting any younger, but at 1 year away from being 5 years away from being 
1 decade away from 1/2 a century old, I didn't think it would all hit me at once. 
The grey hairs I can deal with. I actually enjoy them. But being rushed to the ER in the middle of the night by your crazy roommate (see my other blog: http://rosenylundroommate.blogspot.com/) because you are curled up on the floor screaming in pain, is not the most glamorous entrance into middle age.

That night I racked up $4,000 bill for 2 hours in the ER to be told that I was exaggerating the pain and treated like some kind of pill-popping, drug seeker. 
The following month I visited a doctor's office once a week for 5 weeks, being poked prodded and scanned and pricked and sliced up because early tests showed I possibly had cervical cancer. Then to be taken in for surgery to find that I had tumors and chicken egg sized ovarian cysts as well and endometriosis that had to be removed.
I tell ya, this is not how I envisioned being in my 30's to go. Never the mind that fact that people seem to think that I am and old maid because I've Never married nor had children. I ask you! what is so rewarding and commendable about popping out 3 or 4 kids and not having the means to properly care for them? 
.... well other than the fact that if I did have 3 or 4 kids (or even just 1 for that matter) I would qualify for Medicare and not have to rack up cell phone minutes being on hold waiting for someone to pick up the damn phone in spite of the fact that my call is very important, please continue to hold for the next available representative, only to have to haggle with people trying to explain that I live on an extremely limited income and can;t afford to pay the bill; begging for charity.

I am truly grateful for the charity of INOVA Fairfax Hospital in Virginia. If not for whatever foundation that is paying for my a large portion of my medical bills, I might still be writing in agony on my bedroom floor with with my diseased cells and endometrial lining progressing towards fatal results.


 There are still at least a few kind-hearted souls out there...though I wish one of them would answer the phone and save me from the torture of this awful hold music!