Moo cows

I applied for JD's medical assistance on January 6th and have both faxed and dropped off supporting documentation. On January 29, I hand delivered these same documents to "the drop box" in the local county assistance office. There is no person you can hand deliver and get personalized confirmation. You have to write your own confirmation. WTH? I wonder if that's even legal- would it stand up as legal evidence of providing the documentation? I think I am still emotionally scarred from going into that office. Talk about sensory overload. Thank God I didn't take the kids. Room full of people, like cattle, workers with a permanent glazed expression. And the office itself was dirty and depressing. It was not in a very pleasant area of the city. It certainly isn't an area I am usually visiting. I found the manner in which that office operates to be demeaning-- think cattle in a slaughterhouse and you've got it about right.

For those of you not familiar with Pennsylvania's medical assistance program- JD is automatically entitled to receive MA regardless of our income based on his medical condition of autism. MA usually has to be processed in 30 days unless there are special circumstances or the application is incomplete and then the MA office has 45 days and they must notify you. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to when cases can be completed within 30 days. From talking to other parents, it seems to be standard operating procedure to receive a denial and then have to reapply. Who knows why?

I probably would know if our case worker would care enough to show up and answer her phone. Since January 30, I have called our MA case worker at the county assistance office every day, left 8 voice messages for her, left 3 to her supervisor, and called the status hot line 3 times. I'm beginning to think they don't actually exist or aliens have abducted them. Maybe that's why there's been no communication. Maybe I can take out a missing person report on them. Yeah, it's been fun. I can't tell you why we still have no MA, why no one returns my calls. Apparently neither can their hot line employees who all wonder why we haven't been approved?

Why is this a big deal you ask?

We need MA to pay for ABA, to qualify for other services such as wrap around services, and it would be nice to no longer have co pays. We are paying $40 co pays each time we go to speech therapy and we'll eventually meet our insurance cap on allowable visits.

Does anyone know where the hell our MA caseworker is? Because she's never at her desk. And neither is her supervisor. Maybe I need a cattle prod?

Moo, Moo!

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