An Angry Letter To The Canadian Healthcare System- Am I On A List Now?

For the past five years, I have been suffering.

I’ve seen my doctor more times than I can count, and I’ve seen every specialist under the sun who would agree to see me. The bottom line? I’ve experienced a constant background level of , let’s call it a “total body ache” , on a good day. And on a bad day? It feels like I’m being violently disassembled at the molecular level.

Is it real? It sure feels real.

What do the doctors say? According to them, I’m as healthy as a horse. Every blood test covered by my privileged Canadian healthcare (and many that weren’t) says I’m the very model of that modern major general they wrote songs about… I kid, but I’m serious.

This 38 year old, lifelong coffee drinking, weed smoking, Dorito scarfing, never goes to the gym, maybe three hours of sleep a night, candy bingeing guy who worked with hazardous chemicals in various body destroying jobs for 20 years is apparently fucking aces. Cool. Call me Steve fucking Rogers, then , but could somebody please tell my body that it’s really okay? That all this literal physical pain I’m feeling is just in my head? I have actual diagnosed conditions. Disc issues and stenosis but apparently nothing that my doctor thinks should cause my severity of reported symptoms. My mobility is greatly reduced and my dexterity is a joke …and i am being told it is not real enough.

In my head? You know what? At this point, sure, I’ll take that.

If you’re telling me there is zero explainable reason for the experiences my brain and body are absolutely convinced they’re having, then I must be insane. I’m a big ol’ silly, crazy bird. Coo-coo. Lock me the fuck up.

No, seriously. Lock me up in a hospital and help me. Figure it out. I volunteer my body and my mind, because something is wrong with me , and if I’m not mistaken, that is your fucking job.

Doctors used to try and solve problems. Now, they do as little as humanly possible, limiting each visit to a 15-minute, single-issue discussion. Because God forbid you have multiple issues , then you’d better book two, three, four appointments spread out over six months, during which nothing is ever actually accomplished. Meanwhile, the diagnosis that could help you get paid sick leave or possibly open opportunities for retraining due to disability is dangled like a carrot… on a bureaucratic stick.

A stick designed to make sure everyone gets paid and we stay sick. A sick stick.

Forever returning to their “practice” in a sad display of intentional recidivism.

I’m glad you have a job. I can’t work mine any more and yours is to diagnose me so i can access the safety net i’ve paid into my whole life.

What I’m saying is this: if the life-altering, disabling, painful symptoms I am honestly reporting to you have no basis in the world of physical medicine, then please , before I write any more angry rants , consider shifting your focus to the possibility of a psychiatric condition that might explain my state.

This is no longer about ruling out what I don’t have. I need a document. I need something I can use to get my sick pay for the symptoms I am reporting.

If that document says I can’t work because I’m “crazy” and hallucinating symptoms?
Fine.

That’s what I need.

Sincerely Cody Lee Vaillant (desperate and depressed)