One week after Jacob was placed at Aurora we had our family meeting. By this time I was familiar with these meetings and what would happen.
They would sit us all in a big room with a table.
It’s Jacob, his family, and his care providers. Usually his nurse, his doctor and a social worker.
These people will proceed to tell me that they changed all of my son’s meds, once again, and that he is fine and ready to go home. I was ready, I was so ready for that fight. But I didn’t need to fight this time. This time the Drs told me that Jacob needed inpatient treatment at a residential treatment center and would need to stay there for a month. Maybe longer to get the help that he needed. Finally! Finally they were listening and not just changing his meds and sending him home to “figure it out”. Finally my son was going to get the help he needed. Finally I could breathe….Or so I thought.
I was told that they needed to let insurance know the plan and that they needed to get the approval. The Social worker didn’t think this would be a problem because this was Jacob’s now third visit to a behavioral facility for self harm. She also stated that because of the incident with the bridge getting admitted to an RTC shouldn’t be an issue.
We visited with Jacob for a little while and asked him how he was feeling. We told him we loved him and that we just wanted him to be ok. I hated seeing him like that. He was so mellow, almost not there. His eyes were glassy, he kind of looked through you, he wasn’t my son. I gave him a hug and we went home. I cried the whole ride in the car.
A couple of days later I received a phone call from the hospital. The social worker was calling to let me know my insurance had denied the stay in the RTC stating “It wasn’t medically necessary”. She let me know that I needed to appeal the decision but that there was nothing they could do on their end.
I cried. I felt helpless. I felt defeated.
I called the insurance company And was transferred to the appeal person. I was told that after reviewing the information and going through Jacobs records the decision was that he didn’t need this treatment. I’m not going to lie, I started screaming at the guy. I yelled, I pleaded and I cried….” Don’t you people know my son jumped off a bridge? This is now his 4th attempt!!!” “He needs this treatment!!” The man told me I needed to fill out appeal papers and I could try again but that he doesn’t think it will be approved. It wasn’t medically necessary.
Jacob sat in that inpatient hospital for a month waiting for insurance to approve the treatment at the RTC.
It was denied again a month later and I was told I needed to pick him up because insurance wouldn’t pay for his stay anymore. My Insurance company had decided that he was fine.
To be continued….
#LiveforJacob 