I'm bummed!!!

[Guest guest]

Hi. Rhonda from Indiana here. I just heard from PCP that my

insurance company denied my request. It doesn't surprise me, but I

couldn't help but hope. I have to show proof of at least three

separate attempts of weight loss that were doctor supervised for at

least a 12 week period, one being in the last year. Of course, the

last doctor supervised I did was 2 years ago. I finally chose the

MGB because I have tried everything else and all the diets and pills

and self-help groups and counseling did not help me maintain any kind

of weight loss. Now they are telling me I still haven't done

enough. I'm sick to death of doing all the things I have been trying

to do for the past 25 years. My doctor did put me on Xenical in the

last year, but I don't know if the insurance company will buy that as

doctor supervised because I did not go back every week or month to be

weighed. I finally went off of it because of the awful side effects

I was having. I'm supposed to be getting a letter from my insurance

company (Cigna) the first of next week explaining why I was denied.

They also said I wasn't sick enough yet. The insurance lady from my

PCP office said she would talk to my doctor on Monday to see if he

could word things any differently to make Cigna happy. I want this

surgery so bad. You know, it is humiliating enough that I have done

this to myself without having to go the doctor and tell him all the

personal things that my weight has effected. I hate all the hoops

that the insurance companies make us jump through. My husband is a

recovering alcoholic and when he needed treatment for his DISEASE the

insurance didn't make him jump through all their hoops. It really

burns me up that my problems with food are not considered a disease

serious enough to warrant insurance coverage. Hope I haven't

offended anyone, I need to vent before I go home. I don't want to

take this anger home with me. It is not my families fault that the

insurance company is a jerk!!! Thanks for letting me vent!! Rhonda