#there is a special place in hell for people who abuse elderly and/or disabled people idc idc

[thewritingpossum]

This also destroys me btw

[moonlightreal]

What’s a Changeling?

The word “changeling” was mentioned in the Fate novelization.  What exactly it means in Fate, we don’t know, not until tomorrow.  But I can bang out a post on what it means in the Ye Olde Lore!  Spoiler: it gets hella dark!

Disclaimer: I’m banging out a post from memory, checking no sources (or fiction) and I’m gonna paint with a broad brush and ignore lots of interesting details.

So what’s a changeling?

The Good Neighbors (don’t call them fairies, they don’t like that! Call them Good Neighbors so they’ll be neighborly to you!) don’t have children often or easily.  Their babies are often sickly and weak.  To prevent their people from dying out they adopt from the human world.  Without asking!  A changeling is a sickly fairy baby left in trade for a healthy human baby.  Or it could be an elderly fairy disguised as a baby hoping to be pampered by human parents in his later years, or even a stick of wood enchanted to seem like a baby and left with the human parents.

How do you know your baby has been swapped?

Has your healthy baby suddenly stopped eating?  Or is he suddenly eating everything in sight, never satisfied?  Is your quiet baby suddenly crying night and day?  Has your baby stopped talking or making eye contact?  Or does your baby just look not quite right?  You may have a changeling in the house!

So what happens to the human baby now in fairyland?

Either they’re raised as an ordinary fairy baby, given magic, and grow up as fairies.  Or they’re sacrificed to hell at the end of seven years, depending who you ask.

How can you get your own baby back?

Beat up that baby!

No, seriously.  That was the cure.  Beat up the changeling until its fairy parents get worried about it and magically switch the babies back.  Or you could leave the changeling out in the forest and go back in a few hours to see if the human baby had been left in its place. 

The non-horrifying method of getting the human baby back only sometimes works.  Suspicious parents would do something very strange, like trying to brew beer in an eggshell.  If the changeling was in fact a fairy senior citizen the sight would surprise him into speaking. ‘I've lived a thousand years and never seen anyone brew beer in an eggshell!” And then realizing the jig is up, the changeling has to poof back to fairyland and leave the real fairy behind.

Pretending fairies aren’t real, what was really going on?

Back in Ye Olde times there were no chromosome tests at marriage, no prenatal vitamins, and lots of malnutrition.  Babies that seemed different could have had any sort of genetic or developmental thing.  Some certainly were what we’d call on the spectrum today.  And equally back in the day there were no special schools, no medicines, no plans for helping a child who would always be different to have a full life.  Some people might even see a different child as sinful and not deserving of help. 

The rituals of threatening and hurting the baby could have helped overworked desperate parents vent that desperation and start a fresh relationship with the baby they’d reclaimed from otherworldly kidnappers.  And if the baby died, either because of its health condition or because of the beating, well, it wasn’t the real baby.  It was only a piece of wood enchanted to look like a baby.  The mother could go on without being crushed by the horror of what happened in her family.

Did the changeling belief get people killed?  Yup.  Well, it was claimed. Whether the abusive parents truly believed their disabled child was a supernatural creature or if they were just looking for an excuse to be cruel to a child who didn’t fit their ideal, that’s not something we can know.  But children were beaten, abandoned and killed.  Strangely, so was an adult woman less than a hundred and fifty years ago.  She became ill and her husband suddenly realized she didn’t look quite like herself and became convinced she’d been swapped for a fairy.  Trying to exorcise the fairy, he ended up killing his wife.  She had been very sick indeed and it seems likely that the stress of caring for a maybe-dying wife was too much for the husband and he had a psychotic episode.  You can watch Tony Robinson talk about the case in this documentary.

Psychotic episodes can also happen to mothers soon after birth when the hormones of making pregnancy and birth can briefly just break a person’s brain.  In modern times doctors can look for the signs of mental breakdown but back in the day it wouldn’t have been thought of that way and there were no psychiatric medicines or temporary inpatient treatment to help people.  So here in the rational world there are rational explanations: changelings were not caused by fairy tampering but by sickness in mind or body.

But we’re not here for the rational world we’re here for the Winx world.  Is Bloom a changeling, as a fairy raised by humans?  Kind of, maybe, but without the dark side since she was adopted right out not swapped for a baby that was already there.  But with Fate apparently set for going uber-dark, what kind of changelings will we see?

[scriptshrink]

Writing a Therapist: General Guidelines

There are dozens of different approaches therapists can use to treat clients, and each therapist applies them in their own way. But there are certain things that ALL good therapists you write should do.

A warning - this article is Americentric. I am not sure how these things work in other countries. The laws about these things also vary even by states WITHIN the US. I recommend looking up the laws in the area you’re setting your story in. 

Some of these guidelines are adapted from earlier posts I’ve made and questions I’ve been asked, and have been collected here for easy reference.

Education / Training

In the US, to be a therapist, you have to have gotten an undergraduate bachelor’s degree. If the degree is in Psychology or Social Work, that really helps, but it’s not required to get into graduate school, which is the next step.

A therapist character has two options from here: get their Master’s degree, or go directly for their doctorate.

A Master’s is where the character gets the training to become a licensed therapist.  Typically these programs are 2-3 years, and are often specialized: family therapy, school psych, etch.

During these Master’s programs (usually your second year), your character would have started working with clients under the supervision of another therapist.

By supervised, I don’t mean “supervisor literally sits in every single therapy session.”  It’s more like your therapist would be reporting to a senior psychologist about their cases, consulting with them and following their advice. The therapist character would have to complete several hundred hours of supervised therapy.

After that, the therapist character could sit for an exam in order to get their license.  This exam is super serious business, and can take months to prepare for.

Different states have different rules; I recommend you look up the state you’re setting your story in for more information.

Now.  The other option is if you’d like your character to get their doctorate, and be a full licensed psychologist. These come with a fancy PhD. or PsyD. after the character’s name, and they get to be called “Doctor”. Typically a PhD is more research-based, and a PsyD more clinical-based. Some doctorate programs have you earn your master’s while you’re getting your doctorate.

These programs take longer (between 4 and 6 years, typically), the character needs to write a dissertation, and they need to spend a full year doing a full-time internship in addition to the supervised therapy.

They also need to get licensed (see above).

ETHICS

Confidentiality

This is a big, important thing to consider when writing any therapist. What happens in therapy sessions is almost always confidential - the therapist is bound by ethical code (and even by law) not to reveal what you say, or even that you’re in therapy.

This confidentiality has some exceptions, however.

If the therapist believes the client character is actively suicidal or homicidal, the therapist character has a duty to ensure the safety of both their clients and their intended target. This is typically done through involuntary hospitalization and/or notification of law enforcement authorities. The ability of therapists to break confidentiality in this manner and the legal protection they have for doing so varies by the state.

If the therapist believes that a child is being abused or neglected, they are obligated to report it. (I’ll be covering why this is a very sticky issue in a future post).

If the therapist believes that an elderly or disabled person is being abused or neglected, they must report it.

If the client character is under the age of 18, the character’s parent or guardian may be informed about the therapy that goes on.

The therapist may be court-ordered to hand over their records. This is rare, but it happens.

Therapists may on occasion need to discuss a client’s case or consult with their supervisors or a specialist. This isn’t like ‘water cooler talk’ or gossiping about clients - this is the therapist saying “I need help figuring out how I can best help my client.”

The client character has given their explicit, signed consent for the therapist to pass on information to another person (such as to an insurance company).

Part of the first session with any client would be discussing the limits of confidentiality.

Suicidal thoughts (or in fancy therapy terms, suicidal ideation) do not necessitate hospitalization in and of themselves. Once a character has brought it up in therapy, the therapist will ask a lot more questions to gauge if the character is at imminent risk of committing suicide. Most importantly, the therapist would want to find out if the character has a plan for killing themselves. If they do, do they have the means to do it?

If the answer to both of those things is yes, it is very likely that your character could be hospitalized involuntarily.  

If the therapist character is seriously concerned, but feels like they do not have the grounds to involuntarily hold the client, they would likely suggest that the client voluntarily check themselves in to a hospital to get extra support. The therapist would likely try to come up with a safety contract with him, and make sure their social support system is able to help when they need it most. 

Dual Relationships

Dual relationships, also known as “multiple relationships”, basically mean that in addition to a therapist-client relationship, the two characters have an additional kind of relationship that’s not related to the process of therapy.

For example:

A therapist invests money into a client’s startup company

The therapist meets up with and hangs out with the client with no therapeutic purpose

A therapist is romantically involved with someone who is NOT the client, but close to the client (e.g., a client’s brother, mother, etc.)

The therapist is also a professor, and the client is one of their students

These are bad because it erodes the professionalism of the therapist’s relationship with their client. There’s an imbalance of power that can easily turn into exploitation. The therapist character know the client’s secrets, and they don’t know the therapist’s.

The process of therapy isn’t about the two characters being friends. No matter how much the therapist enjoy working with a client, they’re not friends. Hell, if I ever even encounter a client outside of therapy, just the act of acknowledging that I know them could be a breach of confidentiality.

Anyways, there is some disagreement about what kinds of dual relationships are inappropriate.  

Dual relationships are much more of an issue when a therapist is in a very rural environment - if they’re the only therapist in a town of only 100 people, they’re inevitably going to be in some kind of dual relationship. The key is not to let therapeutic relationship be dominated by it, and never enter into a dual relationship where they exploit the client.

Here are a few examples of dual relationship things that in my mind are not necessarily unethical, but a therapist should tread fucking carefully in:

The client invites their therapist to be at their college graduation

The therapist and client go to the same church, but don’t interact with each other during it

However, there is one universally agreed-upon dual relationship that is not just completely inappropriate, but will get the therapist’s license revoked and can even get them thrown in jail in some places.

Therapists should never, under any circumstances, sleep with their clients.

This is so bad. Please don’t write it unless you include the consequences of doing so. It is an incredible violation of boundaries and ethics, and gives therapists a bad name.

FAQ

Do therapists have a strict “no touch” policy? Or can they sit next to, hold hands with, or hug a crying patient who needs it?

This depends on the therapist. Some are okay with it, some are not. It also depends on the approach that the therapist uses: a person-centered therapist is likely to be okay with this, but a psychoanalytic therapist would probably never do it.

Also, institutions (like hospital psych wards) have requirements the therapist must adhere to, regardless of their personal feelings on it.

Do therapists ever make home visits?

Yes. This typically happens with clients with agoraphobia, when behavioral interventions are being made, or when the therapist would like to observe the client’s routines. For example, it’s pretty common for a therapist to be there and help intervene when a client with OCD is struggling with their compulsive routines and need help in the moment.

Do therapists ever meet with clients outside the office?

See above. If a client is doing exposure therapy, then a therapy session could also be held as a sort of ‘field trip’ - the session would take place out of the office and somewhere that has the conditions the client wants to learn to deal with. This could also be a way for a therapist to support a client through a difficult event (such as testifying in court) - but again, this would be part of a session, and the therapist would be paid for it.

Do therapists ever meet with clients outside of work?

Unless it’s part of an exposure therapy situation (ie, being there to support someone in a real world situation as a part of therapy), that’s a bit of a no-no. See the section above on dual relationships.   

How long is a session?

It depends on the therapist and the setting. Usually, it’s around 45-50 minutes. It may run longer if the client is in crisis, but doing so can mean taking time away or delaying the sessions of other clients the therapist is seeing that day. Therapists usually spend the ten to fifteen minutes after a session to write up notes, do some paperwork, and prepare for the next session.

Disclaimer // Support Scriptshrink on patreon!

[chatting-leaves]

Somebody From The Internet (4/?) - Something Extra, Yet Lacking

Potential TW: A slur, said in context of an antagonist.

September 15, 2011 - Washington, DC

To try to describe the beginning of this story is one that involves a whole spectrum of emotions, in fact the concept of a spectrum is one that defines this story. I awoke to orderly chaos as this was my last full day as an unmarried man, my then-fiance and I had a midday flight to Miami en route to our wedding, held aboard a docked cruise ship before departing for a weekend cruise to The Bahamas. It was an all-in-one solution of sorts for us, a cash-strapped couple given that for much of the last year I had been living off of unemployment and savings. My future in-laws, their second spouses and children, Dad, and my stepmom were joining us, my teenage future brothers-in-law a late addition while my Mom sat this trip out. While trying to stay calm in the rush of last minute packing and the inevitability of lugging a wedding gown through National Airport, I turned to Twitter for some relief. In this, I looked through the tweets of a mutual follower of my future wife and I and saw someone with an interesting name.

"Trisomy21Mommy". A clear declaration that this person was the mother of a child with what commonly is called Down Syndrome.

I grew up in an area where growing up the main employer was a since-closed institution for the disabled and between administrative offices, day centers, and group homes the care of the disabled is a bedrock of the local economy. My mom worked as a member of the local disabled care industrial complex, alternating between the institution and later day centers, and exposed me to those who were the beneficiaries of her work. In high school, my district became a magnet for special needs students from our and neighboring districts as we had a system of including those with differences stemming in part from a beloved teacher having a child with Down Syndrome. To be so public with your status as a special needs parent, at least in 2011, automatically won my respect. without much of a second thought. I immediately started a conversation with this person, relating my experiences on the matter and sharing my views on how the establishment of a formalized "Autism Spectrum" created issues as society had not equipped itself to deal with those on the spectrum as teenagers and adults. She listened and I then aired out my fears of having a child with severe special needs, that "the writers backstage" - a term I used to allude to a higher power - would put me in a position where "if I had to carry them and change [their diapers] for 20+ years, so be it." The conversation then went into direct messages and I found out who "Trisomy21Mommy" was.

The woman behind the handle was a named Carrie and resided in an edge city inside the "Golden Horseshoe" region of Ontario, a catch-all term used to graft areas adjacent to Greater Toronto into a mega-region. Carrie was a freelance writer in her mid thirties but the main focus of her life was her then five year old son, Nathan who as her name alluded to had Down Syndrome. Raising him alone aside from having an elderly parent living with her for the idea of some sort of help, Nathan was Carrie's main focus in life given the minefield of getting him services and special treatments, a process no doubt hurt by a medical mystery that happened about eighteen months earlier.

"One day, Nathan woke up to find that the speech he had gained, after much therapy and prompting was gone. Within the next few days, most of the motor skills he had gained also were gone. The doctors at [the local children's hospital] came back with an additional diagnosis of autism and no timeline on if he ever would regain what he lost."

Part of me saw this person as living the nightmare that I had dreaded, that if my soon-to-be-married self was to have kids, that I might have this to look forward to. The other part of me had some suspicion that something else might be in play, that such a cognitive regression usually doesn't hold off until one was four years old. While I continued our conversation while on the flight to Miami and during a period that night where the hard motel bed gave me little ability to sleep, I put her behind me for what was to be one of the happiest weekends of my life. 

After a weekend soaked in sunshine and alcohol, where I swam with dolphins, spent time with my new family, and had all-around fun, it was time to return stateside and make the trek home. No later than as our car pulled out of the economy parking lot at National Airport, I got a message from Carrie.

"I had a dream about you last night. Maybe you should be with me instead, Nathan can really use a daddy and you sound like you really want to be in Canada."

My jaw flat out dropped. I was brazenly being hit on for totally altruistic reasons by a woman I knew for four days who knew I had just gotten married. While I had spoken highly about Canada and its more egalitarian way of life in our prior conversations, I didn't know how to handle something that escalated so fast.

"If only this was two years ago :-P. Seriously, don't do this again." was the best I could muster. Needless to say, this was the last time she hit on me in such a manner but it was still a shock though she soon opened up about why she'd do such a thing. After spending most of her twenties traveling the world, Carrie decided to settle down with a man she had not known well with the aim of a large family. After two miscarriages, she had a viable child, that being Nathan. Needless to say, her "sperm donor" as she referred to did not want any part in a child that was "crippled" and "retarded", the latter term coming right as that word went from medical term to slur. He soon separated from her to live with his parents and when Nathan was eighteen months old abandoned his wife and child, clearing out their joint bank accounts in the process. The fallout left Carrie penniless and forced her to move in with her living parent while living off the safety net of the province as Nathan's needs and therapies made finding work problematic. At least Nathan had gotten into a kindergarten at a school well equipped for students with disabilities and Carrie at least got some respite from having a life totally centred on her son.

"Last I heard, the Sperm Donor was living somewhere up north. A friend of his wrote to me a couple weeks ago telling me that he has a "real" wife and "normal" kids and has no need for a...I can't say that word, it's so hurtful. He isn't...that," Carrie summarized up the status of a man that she was still legally married to as his status in hiding, under an assumed name, made termination of their marriage impossible. At this point, I began to look at things with some suspicion seeing how almost robotic this whole situation seemed.

In time, Carrie became a good friend as she was the sort of person who would vent to anyone about anything, that any sympathetic ear would do given that her interaction with people outside a parent slowly going into dementia and a son unable to speak was quite limited. She had a lot to say, however she often had an awkward means of saying it and a very simplistic view of getting things done.

"Why do you want to move out to Boston?," she once questioned me when I was openly going on about my wife's wishes to move closer to her family. "You should move up here, Canada is just a better place than the US is since all I hear on the news is about how bad and cruel the US is."

"I don't think immigration works that way. We'd need $10,000 to start and a job offer and my wife is the one more likely to get a job offer," I said knowing that her experience in bioethics and such would put us over the line for points in the CIC's grading system for immigrants.

"I wish I could take you guys in. You Americans really are like abused dogs," Carrie would reply. "Hell, I wish I could make my apartment a shelter for Americans wanting out of their shitty nation." This from a woman that had not been to the US in about a decade, since before she got married even, and whose passport was about to lapse. "If you moved here, you would be able to sponsor her family to join you."

"I think most of them would be disqualified based on age, lack of experience, or due to health issues," I rebutted. While they have since been relaxed, at the time Canada had health controls that would zonk even people who were otherwise golden from moving; another online friend of this time period had to refuse a highly specialized job in Vancouver due to - coincidentally - an autism diagnosis as a child that they had overcome. A firm lost what would've been a great LGTBQ lawyer because of legacy stereotypes written decades earlier.

"Well, that shouldn't be an issue. Just a couple of weeks ago these people moved into my building from Hong Kong and they had the flu and legacy issues from SARS," Carrie responded, blind to the realities of the bureaucracy that Toronto and Ottawa put on her idealistic wishes. Her idealism, her almost blind nationalism to Canada as a nation even, seemed to be a bit of a mask for how things failed her as she soon took to the internet with the story of what really went on with Nathan's birth or at least what she thought happened. Via an anonymous Tumblr blog, she assailed the hospital where he was born for openly downplaying a telltale sign of Down Syndrome that was found during her twenty week checkup, leaving her to believe that she was carrying a healthy baby until when she delivered and her child was whisked away to the NICU for tests. By her own claim, she wasn't told of his diagnosis until two days after he was born and she didn't get to see him until his third day of life. "If I knew this was going to happen, I might have gotten an abortion and have tried again," Carrie summed up, a stark contrast to her railing against the selective abortion of fetuses found to have disorders in utero.

This story, and the general failure and neglect that led to it, led me to want to change my professional course. My caring, yet very rash and desperate, mind decided that what the world needed was counseling for parents and siblings facing a child that was disabled, someone for them to steer them down the right path and even act as a sympathetic ear. While this had been peppered via life experiences and assorted articles, what Carrie endured as a result of Nathan's life was the last straw in not doing anything. I eventually enrolled in an online Masters program, but found as I went on that my idealism was nowhere near reality in terms of making anything work and walked away from what I wanted to do because frankly society had little idea in how to handle it.

As time went on, Carrie's life story got more and more complicated as it was clear that she needed an identity outside of being a self-proclaimed "special needs momma". She tried to get into advocacy, but her ability to travel was hampered by an ailment that left her "medically unable to drive" and dependent on the kind gestures of others more than her testing the bounds of her own independence. She briefly returned to the dating world, exclaiming to me as I was in the middle of my move that she found "someone": a woman, even though she had exhibited zero signs of bisexuality beforehand.

"Given my luck with men, why not?," Carrie exclaimed. True to form with Carrie, the relationship turned out to be an online infatuation that was done after a mere two days, she then pressed on further in life. Being shoved aside was an action that Carrie was no stranger to, between her strained relationship with her siblings for having a "handicapped" child to being estranged by her husband to even losing most of her friendships in the wake of Nathan's birth, real life relationships supplanted by the support web of assorted Down Syndrome and autism parents populating assorted corners of the internet. I gave the emotional support that I could, but sometimes something seemed to be a bit off, as if nothing logically added up. The backstory of Nathan's early years, Carrie's life before Nathan's birth, even how Carrie's life was truly sustainable between her limitations and her son's needs making any typical job an obstacle to obtain.

In time, Carrie's parent that had been living with her declined to the point that they were admitted into a care facility, funded in part I would think by her relatively well-off siblings. While this freed Carrie of the second burden of her life, it also created a problem as the governmental Pension Plan checks she had gotten as well as other subsidies were allowing them to live where they were. As if on cue, Carrie fell for a man who lived in a town on the shores of a nearby Great Lake, a man a little older than she who had two children from a prior marriage whom he had primary custody of. She needed a chance to love again, his kids needed a mother figure, Nathan needed a father figure, the whole thing on paper made a ton of sense.

The relationship lasted about two years, the potential step-children didn't warm up to Carrie as an additional mother figure, and in time this man grew tired of Carrie and the way she came off to him. While they broke up in late winter, he did let her stay until that summer so she could let Nathan (by this point age 9) finish the school year as he had made leaps and bounds in his growth, speaking his first words since the loss of his language five years earlier and regaining the last of the motor skills he had lost in his regression. By some good luck, Carrie and Nathan, now once again alone, moved into an apartment in the same town so he would not have to once again change schools.

By the time of the breakup, I mentally started to check out of the friendship because of how repetitive things had gotten. Carrie constantly second guessing her parenting of Nathan, that her circumstances weren't getting him the best care available as the latest treatments and therapies and even things such as one-on-one helpers and respite care were out of her, and the province's, reach. Things that even her American friends, amongst their flawed and fraying educational and healthcare systems, often took for granted, yet Carrie would rarely let a chance pass to be pitying of Americans and to pound her chest about the Canadian way of doing things being vastly superior. Add in some obsessions of the moment, most infamously a period where she fangirled over the TV series Supernatural and cited it as a reason that Nathan regained some of his speech, and it became repetitive. I love people, I care about people, but it just felt like she was stuck in a cycle and she didn't want to get out of it.

Just in time for this, it was discovered that Nathan had a bone disorder that was prone to fractures. At one point, Nathan had both arms in a cast for weeks after both had severe fractures. Once those bones healed, he ended having fractures occur in both of his knees and ended up spending a summer in hospital in a cast having them heal before ending up using a wheelchair for what turned out to be a couple of years. During this period, they moved into a rented house that was accessible as a replacement for the second floor apartment they had been living in. It was also during this period, to compensate for the increased lifting of Nathan around the house that Carrie took up a new hobby, weightlifting to increase her strength. It was around this time that we reconnected, she having rededicated what social media she was still on to her goal to become a champion weightlifter while my wife and I went on a weight loss journey. 

The definite end of my friendship with Carrie came via one of the most bizarre ways a friendship could end. In Nathan's younger years, Carrie was the sort of parent who would go on and on about the years-long struggle of toilet training her son, an often Herculean task given his cognitive and communication disorders. Considering his long road learning to regain use of his legs after a complex corrective surgery, I had a mere question to ask.

"How does he communicate how to go to the bathroom given his speech and mobility difficulties?" I remember that when he was in a cast that his training was put on pause given his bedridden state so logically I assumed that he still wasn't at first.

Somehow, this turned into an over-detailed message thread on Instagram that went fifteen messages of stupidly curious, potentially borderline pandering, questions when an easy "actually, this whole thing got him out of diapers for once and for all, here's how" would have easily sufficed. This interaction ended up being her cue to exit a friendship that had long run its course, a friendship that I was too reluctant to leave given that I usually am not the sort of person to do so. Soon I found myself blocked on said venue, a whimper of an end to a friendship that was roaring. Bizarrely enough, Carrie didn't block me on any other form of media we were still friends on, she is still mutuals on the side account that I have for weight loss which I sparingly use anymore.

Truth be told, as much as I take the full blame for getting blocked, not having her around has given me the hindsight to realize some harsh truth. While Carrie is a remarkable and strong, emotionally and physically, woman, something about her and I just didn't mix right even in spite of years of friendship. Maybe it's that she tapped into my "Ugly American" side that is harshly critical of my nation of origin, maybe it was the fact that my empathy is so automatic that I felt bad for her and Nathan. The more time passes, the more I seriously wonder what truly motivated me in this friendship. Was I better for knowing her? Of course. Am I happier with her no longer around? Probably.

If anything comes out of this, I feel bad for Nathan in all this. While Carrie has all the reason to keep him out of a group home for as long as possible, the two are truly a package deal at this point, I wonder what will happen years down the road if something happens to Carrie. This doesn't even include the fact that he's a teenage boy with no father figure and little male interaction outside of school, while women do make strong men it still saddens me that he isn't getting the attention he needs. While his fate is much better now than in the past, I do wonder how the future will treat him given his complex needs. I hope they both find peace in the future.

[vahlsing]

The United States needs a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM now!

The Healthcare Reform issue will never be fare and equal for all of the United States citizens until we get rid of the healthcare insurance companies and create a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM. What is the matter with our U. S. congress? Do they receive campaign donations from healthcare insurance companies and are protecting these healthcare money sucking vampires? If Trump wants my vote in 2020 he will have to work and put in place a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM. I know that we can do it; this is not hard to do. The many that I have mingled with (the silent majority) wants this now! Remember Trump represents all of the citizens of the United States not the Republican party. There are about 59,266,437 U.S. citizens that are over the age of 55 and we vote. Action speaks louder than words; demand our U.S. congress that you want a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM now! Please review healthcare exploratory information herein.        

The United States needs a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM. 

To Whom Who Has the Guts to Prepare For the Future!  

The U. S. government’s proposed plan for the Obamacare Replacement is not going to work. Our U.S. Congress does not understand human behavior! They are just creating more bureaucratic laws of which many will avoid participating. Also, many major healthcare insurance companies are already doing business in every State now; so allowing healthcare insurance companies to crisscross State lines is more bureaucracy and a waste of time! Healthcare insurance companies will never do something that will limit their financial $bottom-line! The insurance business is about betting on risk. To make a wager on whether or not a human body will become ill or broken is insane risk; the human body is not a robot! If you try to grab more of the weekly earnings from each worker’s salary like an increase in the percent rate that a worker pays into Social Security to cover your so called idea for healthcare savings accounts; you are just creating another unfair inequality tax increase scam for the worker to pay; and they will yell and scream and call you liars, liars pants on fire! …and not vote for you next time. Our U.S. Congress does not see what’s coming down the future pike; technology and machines will be running everything; and that means that only about 20% or less of the total U.S. population will be working. The remainder of the population will be living on Social Security. The behavior of the U.S. Congress continues to show the people of the United States that they are not inventive and do not know what the hell they are doing. I am sending you my letter herein to try to steer the U.S. Congress’s boat that is lost at sea towards the right direction!    

Population activity for 2017 …(estimated figures from internet search):     

… 324,118,787 …(?estimation of U.S. total population for 2017) 

… 124,710,000 …(?estimation of U.S. population that are working; small percentage can afford to pay for healthcare in 2017) 

… 125,708,787 …(?estimation of adults not working and cannot pay for healthcare in 2017)  

…   73,700,000 …(?estimation of children up to 17 years of age and cannot pay for healthcare in 2017 unless they are protected by their parents and/or guardian; also note that there are over 100,000 foster children eligible for and waiting to be adopted too)  

The United States needs a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM now!

We have public schools education system (education for all) paid for by the government; so we must create a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM for all our U.S. citizens too. Obama’s healthcare is more bureaucracy; plus, you can realize the many middlemen and healthcare insurance companies that are having a feeding $$$,$$$,$$$,$$$ billions frenzy with this type of Obama’s healthcare system. We need a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM paid for by our U.S. government’s collected taxes that covers everyone no matter if they are poor or wealthy, a veteran, a government employee, a private citizen, etc. (all equally covered). Government employees should not be given special full coverage healthcare paid for by the taxpayer when the taxpayer has mediocre healthcare or no healthcare at all. All U.S. citizens should be able to access healthcare treatment for any issue, from any doctor or hospital including full dental and vision that the U.S. government pays directly (no middlemen).

We have too many government healthcare deals which causes middlemen to loot and the ability to commit fraud …(estimated figures from internet search.):    

…separate healthcare for the veterans (which is mediocre healthcare (mediocre veteran doctors and mediocre veteran hospitals) for our veterans; a veteran should be able to access any doctor and hospital to cause competition in the healthcare market to improve healthcare services overall);

About 21,800,000 million veterans that are voters.   

…healthcare known as Medicare (Medicare website says that Medicare doesn't cover long-term care (also called custodial care), dental care & dentures, eye examinations related to prescribing glasses, cosmetic surgery, acupuncture, hearing aids and exams for fitting them, routine foot care, etc…  -- NO DENTAL, NO VISION, NO HEARING, etc. of which old people need desperately and can’t afford to pay for; so when you look in the mouth of an old person don’t be surprise that they have broken rotting infected teeth if any teeth at all. This is a serious health issue as this can lead to other aliments to the body. Also, seniors have to pay into this Medicare of which many cannot afford because the Social Security benefits they receive are below the poverty line and a hardship / destitution. The U.S. government is dangling a healthcare carrot in front of desperate seniors; a "carrot and stick" healthcare deal. Social Security benefits should be at least the federal minimum wage for “everyone equally”, even if they have never paid into it. It’s also discrimination and inequity towards women; you have many women seniors that have raised children and were stay at home moms that were snookered, abused mentally & physically, etc. by their spouse and divorced before the ten year criteria; and some were married to dead beat dads, etc. Life is not utopian; crap happens! Plus, Social Security benefits and senior age (class) should be rolled back to age fifty-five. Many elderly never reach their retirement age because of death and/or they are too disabled to enjoy their retirement. I am tired of seeing elderly people working at Wal-Mart when these elderly should be retired and a young person should be employed in their jobs; and keep in mind that the future is machines doing all the work including driverless public transportation, etc.; only 20% of the population will be working in the future);  

About 57,000,000 million voters on Medicare.     

…healthcare known as Medicaid (income bracket based);

About 70,000,000 million voters that are on Medicaid.  

Above Total: about 148,800,000 million people (voters) are on government healthcare of the United States out of the overall estimated population of 324,118,787 million.   

AND… Obama government subsidized healthcare (income bracket based);

About 11,400,000 million have Obama subsidized healthcare that are voters; this figure should tell you that no one is rushing through the doors for this healthcare deal!     

We need to get rid of all these healthcare deals and the United States must create a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM for all its citizens. Over half of the United States population is on government healthcare now if you count the children!  

AND… Individual doctors and hospitals will still be liable for bad medical diagnosis & treatments to patients; and these individual doctors and hospitals could be sued by their patients for personal injury. The government is just the “payer” of the “national healthcare” bill (proof of medical treatment purchase invoice) and not liable for bad medical diagnosis & treatments to patients. Healthcare competition (its services) in the market will improve remarkably!        

Being able to access individual doctors and hospitals is a life or death issue for all Americans equally.    

Our “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM should be part of and managed by the “Social Security Administration”. Our Social Security number is proof that the person seeking medical treatment is a citizen of the United States. The “U.S. Department of Health and Human Services” should be a subsidiary of the “Social Security Administration”. We need to lessen government departments and become efficient and well-organized. (Note: immigrants working in the United States should get a special Social Security number identifying that the person is an immigrant. They should also get special driver’s license cards identifying them as an immigrant. No immigrant should be issued a regular driver’s license in the United States whereby they can use it for identification to access voting in elections and other beneficial government programs.)   

By having a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM for all would cut out the middle men and healthcare insurance companies, which would save the government and everyone money in the long run. Insurance Plans are just a gimmick for the healthcare insurance companies to make money and not pay out! …it’s like insuring your right leg and not insuring the left leg of the human body! … Read the fine print (health benefits & health insurance plans contain exclusions and limitations). If most Americans were affected with some kind of new (sudden) disease outbreak that has no cure; does not cause death but causes crippling paraplegic bedridden disabilities; do you think the insurance companies would file bankruptcy because they could not handle the payout costs? Sure they would. There are about eighteen healthcare insurance companies in the United States that are raking in $100s of billions from Americans. It should be illegal to sell healthcare insurance in the United States; these healthcare insurance companies are nothing but vampires feeding off of the sick. Healthcare insurance company Aetna had a financial report of $734 million in profit on $15.8 billion in revenue for the third quarter in 2016; Aetna is the nation’s third-largest health insurer by revenue (and is in all States). If Americans did not spend (give) the $100s of billions to healthcare insurance companies; those $100s of billions would of been spent by Americans towards goods & services and would of improved the economy money flow overall. I know negative personalities will look at this prospect of having a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM for all as a bleak concern, until they are in dire-straits and over whelmed with an illness and/or a broken body then it will be too late for them.       

Note: National Health Expenditures 2015 Highlights (cms.gov/research) …In 2015, U.S. health care spending increased 5.8 percent to reach $3.2 trillion, or $9,990 per person. The coverage expansion that began in 2014 as a result of in the Affordable Care Act continued to have an impact on the growth of health care spending in 2015. Additionally, faster growth in total health care spending in 2015 was driven by stronger growth in spending for private health insurance, hospital care, physician and clinical services, and the continued strong growth in Medicaid and retail prescription drug spending. Lastly, the overall share of the U.S. economy devoted to health care spending was 17.8 percent in 2015, up from 17.4 percent in 2014.  

We could have a federal national 3% percent sales tax (transaction tax) to help pay for this “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM whereby everyone is making a contribution to our NATIONAL HEALTHCARE FUND via their buying activity;  

…and the States could share the cost and have a 3% percent sales tax increase added to their State’s sales tax percent to help pay for our “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM which would create a 6% percent combined federal tax revenue.      

…We should collect a federal 3% percent sales tax on all transactions from all the United States financial exchanges! That would help pay for our “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM! We should realize that the financial exchanges are high roller speculative gambling casinos; a serious investor holds their security for long term; and I don’t see much of that with all that daily buying and selling activity on all of the financial exchanges.        

…Example: the trading volume on the NYSE in 2015 totaled U.S. $18 trillion, nearly equal to the U.S. gross domestic product and approximately 20% of the gross world product, according to an estimate calculated by the World Bank (fxcm info.).  

…The NYSE averaged over U.S. $170 billion in daily trading value (2015). (Just think about this: a federal 3% percent sales tax on $170,000,000,000 =  $5,100,000,000 each day collected from the NYSE to pay for our “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM; and that was the 2015 figure! What will be the 2017 figure! I say it will be a huge amount of cash!    

AND… don’t forget that we will be collecting a federal 3% percent sales tax from all the financial exchanges combined; which will total an enormous amount of cash daily!    

…All these collected federal 3% percent sales taxes on all transactions from all of the United States financial exchanges; and all these collected federal 3% percent sales taxes (6% if you add the States 3% contribution) on goods and services go straight into the “Social Security Administration” account to pay for our “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM.        

Please President Trump work on this important issue…  

…a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM for all its citizens is a must for the United States now!    

Make a note (March 2017) about the U.S. congress’s new healthcare reform law (bill) called the American Health Care Act that is 123 pages long; of which ten pages of this so called new healthcare law (bill) is devoted to lottery winners (as like lump sums / like lottery winnings may disqualify Medicaid recipients for federal funds). The new administration promised us less government control and regulations; why do we need ten pages of the new healthcare law centering on lottery winners? Our U.S. congress is still lost at sea with a hole in their boat!  

Contact the U.S. Congress today and demand for a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM!  

…If you want a good healthcare system, make the designers of the healthcare system (U.S. representatives and senators) have it as their own healthcare insurance too. 

Look Beyond the Stars for Spiritual Guidance,    

Christina M. Vahlsing, Vahlsing Inc.    

Email:  vahlsinginc@gmail.com      

Action speaks louder than words. Everyone just aggressively spread the word, riot in the streets and break down the door of their U.S. congressman and demand them that you want a “ONE” FULL COVERAGE NATIONAL HEALTHCARE SYSTEM.