Berning Bridges

It's really strange to witness the beginning of a general election from overseas. After the last guy got elected in 2016, I was like

and got the fuck out of the United States. But it wasn't just Trump. I left the United States for a whole slew of reasons, and it's difficult to narrow it down to just one so here's the lot:

1. Trump does not represent what I stand for as an American.

2. Taking the above into account, I don't trust Trump to do the right thing for me as an American citizen, a woman, an insulin dependent diabetic, an alcoholic, a student loan debtor, and a democrat. I list "democrat" because the recent onslaught of diplomatic shenanigans and blame games brought to you by president Fuck Face.

3. In the Czech Republic, I don't make enough money after the exchange rate to pay off my student loans. I'm essentially saving myself $30,000 if I continue to live here for another 15 years.

4. Considering the on-again, off-again relationship with North Korea, I feel safer in the European continent rather than on the west coast of the United States. While I'm closer to the actual Motherland, it sort of eases me that Putin and Trump go at it real dry behind our backs so I don't think there's any real danger.

5. The cost of living in Seattle has turned from expensive to fucking atrocious. I like living alone and I'm past the point in my life where I can live with a person who isn't putting it in me on the regular.

Part of the research I did before I moved to Brno was all of the bureaucratic red tape I would have to go through, but not just on the Czech side. I wanted to see what happened to my drivers license, my permanent address, and my opportunity to vote. I wasn't renouncing my citizenship and declaring war on the United States (yet) so my rights as a voter are recognized overseas. I thought "hey in four years, we could probably fix this."

"Fix this" is pretty vague when it comes to the assertive action needed with the burgeoning clusterfuck of what's currently going on in the White House. Trump said a while back "if you don't like it here, you can leave." The guy didn't have to tell me twice, plus I was already gone. I waved to him but I don't think he saw it.

I've been able to continue supporting Bernie from abroad. He was my first choice in 2016 because he speaks to my issues directly and he's been fighting for me since before my existence. Some call him a career politician, but I don't see a problem with that. He's made it his life's work to help Americans, the people of Vermont, and those who are timelessly marginalized by the right. It would be different if he was taking corporate money or was in cahoots with billionaires, but he isn't. And he's not just going to take care of me. He's also going to take care of you, no matter who you are, and I can get behind that.

But I don't consider myself a "Bernie bro," and to be honest, I don't think I've actually ever encountered one in real life or on the internet. The people or trolls who have been described as intentionally argumentative, biased, blind, angry, and stubborn remain elusive to me. There's a huge difference between the people whose first choice for president is Bernie Sanders and the people who become militant and extremist with his cause. Supposedly people have had the displeasure of encountering Bernie bros, and I'm not discounting their experiences. It might be because of the company I keep or the things I choose to expose myself to, but I think they might just be passionate idiots who occasionally enjoy a good political circle jerk.

Part of the reason why my support of Bernie has remained consistent is because of his democratic opponents. I really did like Elizabeth Warren and I don't think she's the corporate criminal who people are making her out to be. She still has yet to endorse any one person in the race and it would flip everyone out of she endorsed Bernie, but I don't think she will. She still has connections to the establishment, the same establishment of lying dog-faced pony soldier candidate Joe Biden.

I had to get someone over the age of 65 to explain to me what the fuck a lying dog-faced pony soldier is because that's the world that Joe Biden lives in, an unrelatable John Wayne hellscape with mysteriously grandiose stories about the weird neighbors in the 1950s. Biden looks like he could get in a fight with a parakeet and barely live to tell about it. 

But Joe Biden scares me, and not because of his linguistic gaffs that have surfaced as a result of the mainstream media. He scares me because even though his attitude isn't exactly like Trump's, he won't have my best interests in mind. He has a horrible track record with women, the LGBT community, pro-war senate votes, the criminal justice system, and marijuana use on a federal level. Every candidate at one point or another has said "we need to combat prescription drug prices." Cool. Agreed. But I don't think Biden has spent enough time with real Americans who have real medical issues. His son had cancer and his son died of cancer, but the Bidens aren't facing the reality of having to choose between life-saving medication or paying rent, going to Mexico to buy medication, starting a GoFundMe to afford required medication and care, or seeking out cheaper medication that's intended for dogs. After analyzing some sources/tweets, it became clear that if Biden were the democratic nominee, I wouldn't be able to return to the United States because Trump would run rings around that guy (although sign me up for those debates because they're going to be a fucking riot). Living in the Czech Republic isn't what I signed up for, but this is my life now. Ideally I'd like to go back to living where I was before because even though it's stupid expensive, I miss the life I had in Seattle. A Bernie Sanders presidency is my best bet to returning home and ending this whimsical saga abroad. 

But people have their concerns about Bernie, too. He had an emergency stent put in but he got right back on the campaign trail. He remains mentally lucid, aware, and doesn't say anything off book that would put him in hot water. There's also this rampant fear of communism within the older communities in the United States. Communism has never been an issue in my lifetime, and it continues to not be while I live in a former Soviet satellite state. The Dubya administration bolstered their efforts in making terrorism the new fear instead of communism. We had terror alert levels, commemorative 9/11 plates, and additional precautionary measures in every FAA security line at every goddamn airport, which made stand up comedy infinitely worse for a number of years. And now every Trump supporter who lived through McCarthyism can return to using communism as a fear tactic. (I do want to point out that communism is a political system and socialism is an economic system because some dudes in my Facebook feed constantly like to disagree despite the evidence and testimonials). But in 2008 we elected the guy with a middle name of Middle Eastern descent, so maybe one day we can have hope again.

The one concern I have with Bernie is that I'm not sure about his expertise in handling foreign policy. He's a career anti-war guy and I completely agree with that. However, when it comes to participating in negotiations, diplomacy, and other events on the world stage, I don't know if he could do it. He's a guy who would definitely be able to take care of things at home, and maybe that's what the United States needs. Maybe we need someone to focus on fixing shit at home instead of barging our way into other country's issues like it's our national past time. Maybe we can actually fix this.

If Biden gets enough delegates to receive the democratic nomination, I'll vote for him. I've seen people say "he's just democratic Trump!" and while there's some truth to that, I think Biden would be able to approach other nations of the world with more tact and grace instead of crashing into a fake painting on the side of a rock like Wile E. Coyote each and every time. If Biden's the nominee, I think it would be a complete disaster. But those debates though...

I don't like waiting out the results of this election because it really does determine my future as an American living abroad. Usually when there's been any developments made with the primaries or coronavirus, I find out about it when I wake up and the majority of the people I know are making their way to bed. I'm hoping that the states whose primaries are held today can see what a difference their choices will make now that it's down to Bernie, Biden, and dark horse Tulsi Gabbard. 

Czech Healthcare Adventure! Part III

Over the weekend, I was turned away from a Czech emergency room. 

Yep. Turned away. 

For the last two weeks my blood sugar has been wildly unstable. I talked with my doctor numerous times to figure out what steps I needed to take to decipher what sorts of Enigma-like codes my body was signaling to me. Narrowing out possibilities is pretty much all I can do. It's a trial and error process since I can't ask my body what's wrong with it. If something is amiss, I'll usually see it in my blood sugar levels before anything else. 

I adjusted both of my insulin levels with no success. My next method of detective work involved going off certain medications. I thought the Czech version of American drugs were the culprit, but even that seemed strange since all of the essential ingredients are the same. Because I was going low at seemingly random times and more frequently, I was having to eat total garbage. When I'd go low again after correcting myself with Skittles or juice, the last thing I wanted to do was consume anything else, and having to do this often was causing havoc on my digestive system. I cancelled classes because my stomach was in knots after eating so much while trying to prevent myself from going low to the point of seizure or unconsciousness. Having a normal meal at scheduled times became rare. And then on Saturday night it was clear something was incredibly wrong. 

My body got to the point where it only had two modes of operation: not shitting at all or shitting way too much. I figured my digestive system was deteriorating from all the sugar I was having to eat to stay level. My teeth hurt from the increased amounts of acidity and I need to brush very gingerly. I became nauseous, sad, frustrated, and tired. I was exhausted from running out of my classes to drink juice and run back in, from having to carry around extra weight of food and drink when businesses were closed, and from the amount of phone calls I was having to make to try and get my questions answered. I was getting low multiple times a day and nothing seemed to work.

My blood sugar is usually supposed to be between 90 and 120, but these changing levels were causing me to go as low as 40. I'd be sweaty, shaky, unable to form a complete sentence, and extremely panicky. My students noticed, the other teachers I work with noticed, and having to explain an autoimmune disease in choice vocabulary to a non-native speaker proved to be very difficult. I was worn out from the questions and the onslaught of misinformation I needed to discredit. 

Then my kidneys started hurting. My joints in my hips and knees were inflamed with unidentifiable tension and I couldn't stand up straight without having to keel over and rest my weight on my knees. I wasn't able to lie down without bending into a fetal position and my stomach felt like it was infinitely expanding from having to constantly consume food. I told my mom about my symptoms and she suggested I go to the ER. Despite being in the Czech Republic for six months, I wasn't sure how to go about that. I knew where the hospitals and urgent care centers were, but what I didn't know was that some hospitals only specialize in certain things. It sounds naive and probably American to think that I should be able to go into any ER and be seen immediately, but I was totally wrong. 

Kisha, my closest friend in CZ, lives one bus stop away from me, and when I decided to go to the hospital, she walked up the hill at 2am and met me with my blood sugar at 60. I tried to eat but my blood sugar kept going down. I was frantic and crying. What should I bring with me? How long will I be gone? What if something is seriously wrong with me? What was the cause of all this? My dead pancreas couldn't spring back to life after being deceased for eight years, so why the random instability? 

I grabbed some snacks, my toothbrush, an extra pair of underwear, a roll of toilet paper, and my phone charger. We got a cab to the urgent care hospital that was just down the street from the school where we work. I was wearing my sweatpants and slippers I bought for rehab and tried to be as comfortable as I could, except my body was clearly fighting my every move. After arriving at urgent care, we spoke broken Czech to a few different staff members to try to locate the actual emergency room. In the US, an ambulance bay in a hospital is pretty obvious when you see it, but in the middle of the night with next to zero neon signage, it took some lengthy navigating of narrow cement hallways, outdated elevators, and stenciled warnings from the communist era. 

When we finally reached the door to the actual ER, I was resting with my hands on my knees and my lips were turning blue. I was sweating and shaking and was in serious need of help when a nurse appeared at the door. She crossed her arms and stared at Kisha and I as if she were surprised to see us. We explained in Czech that I was diabetic and my blood sugar was low, but through miscommunication she kept telling us she couldn’t give me any insulin. (I’ve had a few people ask me if they should give someone insulin when their blood sugar is low. DO NOT DO THIS. It will send them into shock even faster and they’ll most likely have a seizure. Insulin is what keeps blood sugar low, not raise it). We kept telling her I didn’t need any insulin when a doctor came out to see us. He rolled his eyes and spoke with her, and then she told us that they don’t help diabetic people here because this wasn't that kind of a hospital. This particular hospital was marked as urgent care but only for trauma related circumstances. While Kisha and I were trying to decide what to do, another couple came in and were also turned away. At this point I was heavily shaking and not realizing it at the time. I needed serious medical assistance and a hospital turned me away? What do we do now?

We went back outside to the entrance of the hospital and sat on the curb trying to get a cab late on a Saturday night. Our local cab apps for Brno weren’t working and “hailing” a passing cab here leaves you ignored and scoffed at. I finally bit the bullet and dialed 112, our emergency number. Luckily to work for 112, speaking English is a requirement, so I spoke with a representative and had the following conversation.

Me: Mluvis anglicky?

Rep: Yes.

Me: I’m currently at the hospital on Ponavka and I’m in a lot of pain and my blood sugar won’t go up. I’m diabetic and I need serious help.

Rep: You need to go to the hospital.

Me: …right. I went into the hospital at Ponavka and they turned me away.

Rep: And you need help?

Me: YES.

Rep: You need to tell the nurse you need help.

Me: I already did that. And they told me they couldn’t help me. A hospital. Told me they couldn’t help me. So now I’m trying to figure out what to do. That’s why I called this number.

Rep: Can you go back inside?

Me: …hang on.

Kisha and I walked all the way back up to the emergency room with a janky elevator ride and damp hallways. The nurse came back out to see us and once again looked surprised to see us one more time as if she had done something for us earlier. I said to her, “jedna jedna dva” and pointed at my phone so she knew who was on the line. The representative with 112 spoke with the nurse in Czech for a few minutes. She handed the phone back to me and the rep and I continued our conversation.

Rep: You need to go to another hospital.

Me: Even though I’m literally in a hospital? Right now?

Rep: Yes, you’re in a trauma hospital. They only treat serious injuries like broken bones.

Me: So what if that person with a broken bone is diabetic and they’re having some serious issues? Do they get sent away, too?

Rep: You can’t be treated there.

Me: Clearly.

Rep: You can go to the military hospital two kilometers away. They are open during the night.

I hang up the phone and Kisha looks at me completely dumbfounded. Urgent care turned out to not be as urgent as we needed it to be, and we were fairly astonished that hospitals can be picky with who they treat in a time of emergency. This surprise might be our “we grew up in the United States and we can get help anywhere” inhibition kicking in, but it seems ridiculous that in a supposedly developed country like the Czech Republic you can’t get the proper medical care when you need it. Sure, they’ll hand out health insurance like Facebook event invites, but they’re going to be super selective with who and what they treat.

Kisha and I dug into our phones and located the military hospital across the river. She told me my lips were blue and my face was sunken in and I started to get scared. I was sitting on the curb outside of a hospital that refused to care for me. A cab finally showed up and took us to the heavily gated military castle/hospital in another part of town. A small old Czech man was guarding the front gate with an old tv and rolled cigarettes, and he wore a uniform but it hadn’t been pressed or starched in years. Once again, in broken Czech, we explained through the metal gate that I was in pain and needed help. He gave us rudimentary but understandable directions on where to go after he let us pass through his barricade.

Our second emergency room had a door bell we had to ring for service. The entire hallway was empty, white, and clean with only two chairs available for patients, which could either be a good sign or a bad sign. The good sign being that they keep people healthy enough here to not have to need to see an internal specialist, the bad sign being no one actually comes for help. A haggard looking nurse opened the door to Kisha and I. She had clearly been sleeping and wasn’t up for having a conversation in Czech or English. I asked her if she spoke English and she nodded through her lucid dream. I explained I was in pain and couldn’t stand up right and that there was something wrong with my digestive system. I didn’t even mention I was diabetic because I was afraid of being turned away again, which is fucked up I have to leave out a pretty important detail to be seen by the Czech medical system. She held her finger up to give her a minute and she went back into her clinical abyss.

The two of us shrugged. After a minute the sleepy nurse returned and motioned for me to come with her. This was twice the progress I had made at the last hospital, so it seemed promising. The emergency room here was modern but it had common communist features in certain areas. While most of the medical technology was updated, their measuring systems, color schemes, and signage was a bit archaic. She sat me in a chair where I spoke with a Czech doctor who was stationed at a computer. At his station was a beer mug. A large glass of beer with about an inch of what I assumed to be beer. Because let’s just fuck this night up a little more. Maybe the tired nurse was drunk, who knows. I messaged Kisha over Facebook Messenger to keep her updated on my progress and about the speakeasy ER I was cautiously waiting in.

The Czech doctor spoke slow English with me so we could both understand each other. I explained I had some serious joint pain in my hips, knees, and back, that my blood sugar had been very unstable for about two weeks, and that my stomach was hurting from the amount of liquid and food I was eating to remedy the bouts of hypoglycemia. He asked which medications I was on and I wrote down a list and dosages, all of which are known here in the Czech Republic. The nurse brought me over to a gurney and told me to lie down. She tested my blood pressure, my slightly elevated temperature, and listened to my breathing. She pounded on my back exactly where it hurt and massaged my stomach for signs of pain. She took some blood and even started to smile a bit as she entered her professional routine. The nurse walked away and returned from an old medicine cabinet with a glass one of these:

“We need your urine.”

Totally unaware this hospital also doubled as a center for alchemy in the 1900s, I heaved myself off of the gurney and towards the door marked “WC.” Inside the bathroom that was also a storage closet, I held the glass cylinder and sized it up to the toilet I was supposed to be using. Everything in Europe was tiny except for this glass cylinder. I had to do some surveying measurements before actually peeing because I wasn’t even sure I was going to be able to follow the nurse’s instructions exactly as she had planned. I moved around in the small space, crouching and eyeing and analyzing and studying. How am I going to pee in this?

Eventually I managed without knocking any shelves over or causing a scene and returned to the desk with the elusive elixir. I noticed the beer mug on the desk again. Maybe that was someone else’s pee, I thought. Maybe in this hospital, as long as you’re peeing into anything made out of glass, it counts as a valid urine sample. Maybe a Czech mystic will appear and grant me knowledge on future philosophy. Maybe this was like rubbing a lamp to them.

The nurse gave me more tests. My torso was x-rayed for the pain I was in and I was given a sonogram with an amount of lube only suitable for wrestling. The staff was nice but quiet. I wasn’t talking much just because I didn’t know if they could understand me, but when spoken to in English, I made sure to return my speech at the same speed. After resting for a bit longer under a hospital blanket that was most likely flammable, the doctor came back and told me I had a bacterial infection to be treated with antibiotics. At least the mystery was solved about why I was barely functioning over the last two weeks. No more math or diluting dosages to ensure safety. I even got a shot in my ass for the pain I was in. I’m still unclear what it was, but as a tattooed diabetic person, I can handle needles pretty well. The pain in my hips and knees subsided and I felt less tension in my stomach than I had earlier in the night. So far so good. Kisha and I thanked the nurse and doctor profusely and left the hospital as the birds were going crazy in the early morning dawn.

We took one of the trams that were now operating in the early morning to the 24 hour pharmacy. Less than three minutes and five dollars later, we were walking out of the pharmacy with antibiotics in hand. Our adventure ended at the Tesco near Kralovo Pole. We bought cheese and more snacks just in case my blood sugar was still going low. I’m so lucky to have Kisha here with me. She initially friended me on Facebook almost a year ago when I had just decided to move to the Czech Republic. I was being given an absurd amount of misinformation from Czechs, EU nationals, and non-EU citizens about how I should immigrate properly as an American, and as a fellow American expat, she set the record straight for me. She answered all of my questions patiently and took the time to explain the visa process, the trade license, and what life is like in Brno. We had been talking for roughly six months before we had even met at a coffee shop near my house. I couldn’t have done this without her and I tell my parents that all the time. There’s no way I could have reached the level of success I’ve had in a foreign country without her help. She took time out of her evening to take me to the ER for the whole night and had the patience to battle Czech medical bureaucracy one hospital at a time. I’m incredibly thankful for her friendship.

A few days later, I’m at home taking a few days off of work because the antibiotics I was given are creating a great wave of Kanagawa in my stomach. I’m no longer in pain but I’m extremely tired and getting back on a normal eating schedule that doesn’t include pounding an entire bag of Skittles once a day is a bit of a challenge. I’m drinking lots of fluids and my parents text me every few hours to see how I’m doing. I emailed my doctor about what to do with my digestive system so now I’m taking probiotics and antibiotics. I wonder if there’s just “biotics?” If I can untether myself from the bathroom for a few minutes, I should be able to go back to work on Thursday. I only have a few more weeks left at the school before I start my new job next month, and I really didn’t need my body to give up on me this week. I’m starting to go a little stir crazy from spending so much time resting in bed but I’ve been hanging out with kitty and we started watching war movies even before I found out Gunny died.

And so ends our third Czech healthcare system adventure. To sum up: if you’re going to die, just make sure you die at the correct hospital.

Czech Healthcare Adventure! Part II

I've been on a real Bob Ross kick lately. My mom used to watch it when I was a baby and my grandfather painted along to his happy little creeks and cabins with roofs full of snow in his old age. There's a Twitch stream that plays all of the episodes, even the ones where Bob's son and his glorious mullet do a guest spot. I go to sleep at night listening to Bob describe a squirrel he rescued and named Peapod and his soothing ramblings about combining colors, techniques, and tales Florida and Alaska. It's very zen, something I've sought after for much of my life. 

YES, YES THEY ARE.

Today I went to my first "diabetologie" appointment. The Czechs are specific when it comes to medical care, meaning that instead of seeing an endocrinologist like I would in the US to treat Type 1, I see someone who specializes in only diabetes and not other endocrine disorders. It was a relief knowing I wouldn't have to explain my disease to a professional who may not know all of the ins and outs of dosages, regimens, numbers, and time tables. Unfortunately, this has happened before. It's like if you woke up during open heart surgery and told the doctor "here why don't you let me take over for a bit."

St. Anne's University Hospital, or"fakultni nemocnice u vs Anna v Brne" as I've learned to refer to but not pronounce, is a sprawling campus of old Soviet buildings, newer, pristine architecture, and baroque moldings near the center of Brno. The map I downloaded to find "Building J" was color-coded but also in Czech, so I did that thing where you walk one way while watching your location on GPS to see if you are indeed heading in the right direction. Building J did exist, however it was quite a hike around the campus to locate it. At one point I wondered if it was maybe like the Back Building in Mean Girls.

With a low ceiling and steel chairs lining the hallways, I wasn't sure if I was going to a diabetologist as much as I was going to be contacting any form of asbestos. These hallways had seen better days with their scuffed patterned floors and shredding yellow and orange wallpaper.

On Pinterest it might be referred to as"Shabby chic!" I found a hallway full of doors and outside each door was a vinyl bench with no form of support.

The door with my doctor's name on it had people going in and out of it so I figured this must be a good thing. They're not being wheeled out of the room with a respirator or a blue face. So far, so good.

Like if this room was a hospital.

I have now spent enough time here to know that when you see a chair or an area for waiting, that's where you wait, which sounds obvious but if you go further to investigate behind doors that aren't marked clearly, a woman named Petra may scold you in Czech until you just sit anywhere close by until you're officially retrieved. So I sat and waited outside. 

For Czech people, my last name is pronounced "Dawn-uh-hoo-ee." With the stress on the first syllable and no accessible diphthongs, I've learned to listen for various covers of my surname from people I don't know. A young nurse fetched me and my seemingly normal last name from the hall and brought me into a large examining room and office which didn't look like it belonged inside the semi-decrepit Building J. Brightly lit with new furniture, recently manufactured medical supplies and machinery, and surfaces free of dust or minerals, the nurse who spoke some English informed the doctor I had Type 1 and that I needed a new blood glucose meter and the appropriate test strips. Certain test strips only work with certain meters, and since I couldn't buy strips in Metric meant for an Imperial Measurement System meter, I needed a whole new kit. They spoke back and forth in Czech for a moment and then came the question: "Insurance?"

I signed up for state health insurance after my visa was approved, but my insurance card still hasn't arrived in the mail. I also didn't have anything on me that proved I was technically in the system, so in this circumstance, I basically didn't have insurance at all. I showed them my traveler's insurance, which only covers you in the event of a nuclear apocalypse or emergency treatment upwards of $200,000, but they shook their heads. They continued to talk in Czech as I brought out my bag of supplies filled with both types of insulin, spare needles, my glucose meter, and test strips. I could have just been some random person who came off the street, so I wanted to show them that I currently have the supplies needed for someone with Type 1. In broken English, the nurse said, "We give you a meter and test strips free, and in two weeks you come back when your insurance card comes, yeah?" 

Umm, fuck yeah. I smiled like an idiot and said "ano, ano prosim." Getting a free glucose meter and the accompanying strips in the United States means getting one from a diabetic friend or selling your first born and sometimes second born. One of the reasons people with diabetes let their care suffer during a financial crisis is because they simply can't afford the test strips, let alone the insulin. I test my blood sugar four to five times a day depending on when I'm eating and how long I'm awake. In the United States, a pack of 100 test strips without insurance is $129, meaning every 20 days, I'm out $129 if I actually want to manage and treat my disease instead of slowly die. Test strips are a HUGE inconvenience. You need them to figure out how much insulin to give yourself before meals and to find out if you really do have low blood sugar or if you're just imagining it. Getting 100 of them for free in addition to the hardware is a big deal. 

Woo! Czech glucose meter!

The nurse who spoke some English and another nurse who spoke zero English physically acted out how I'm supposed to use the meter. Even though I've been testing my blood sugar for almost eight years, I couldn't bring myself to stop their comedic safety demonstration. The Czech nurse poked her finger and said "owwwiiieeeee!" and then blew on it to exhibit the minor pain and inconvenience of pricking myself. "Into blood!" Aren't we all. They packed up my new kit and sent me into my doctor's actual office where he asked me some basic diabetes related questions: when were you diagnosed, at what age, what symptoms were you experiencing, how often do you go low, and which insulins are you on. I brought out my bag of supplies and showed him the insulins I use. One insulin I use is what's called a basal insulin and lowers me to a healthy "baseline" for 24 hours.

I use the other insulin before meals or when I'm consuming carbs, which can only be done every 4-5 hours. 

He recognized both pens and told me he would give me prescriptions when I came back in two weeks once my health insurance card had arrived.

Basaglar and Humalog, the two insulins I need to use.

Insulin pen with a teeny tiny needle.

Then my doctor told me, "I'm not going to charge you for today since you only needed a meter and there's no exam. When you come back in two weeks, your insulin prescriptions and the appointment will be covered. If you need any lab work done, that will be covered, too."

I was floored. I smiled at him and almost cried. Normally in the Czech Republic you need cash in hand, although not much, before any medical appointment if you don't have health insurance for your visit. I was expecting to pay something today, but not nothing. If this was the situation in the United States, I might need to start a GoFundMe to cover the costs of staying alive. I told him that it wasn't this easy in the US. "We know," he told me. 

Finally, a country that understands that staying alive is a basic human right. If we were brought into this world without consent, there should be an economic and social system in place to make sure we can be the healthiest capable people contributing to society. Why is that so hard to understand? If the US has such a hard on for being the greatest economy, shouldn't we have a healthcare system in place that takes care of the people who put forth the effort and time to stimulate a "great" country?

After gleefully leaving the hospital, I literally skipped back to the tram stop and went to teach for the afternoon. I showed the other teachers my new rig and spent the next few hours going over phrasal verbs, how "synonym" and "cinnamon" are two entirely different words, and the correct pronunciation of "hyperbole." I'll update again in two weeks after my next diabetology appointment. If the Czechs keep taking care of me like they are, I'm going to be here for a long time.