Getting sane is making me poor

I have whinged previously about the faults of the public health system here in Oz. And yet here I am, now an official public health 'mental service user'. The state picked up the bill for my two week hospitalisation, my weekly meets with Case Manager and my Psychiatrist. The state gives me a concesssion on my visits to the GP and even on my meds... And pays me a small, but livable stipend pension, whilst I am unable to work.... so I'm doing better than I would be in a lot of other countries.. and for that I'm grateful!

And yet... I recieved an electricity bill today, that was massive! What is the link between that and my mental health, you ask? Well, in my worse periods of depression, just being able to wash and dry clothes so I don't lie around in a stinking mess of bleurghiness (yes, that is a word...i'm making it one!) takes a huuuuuuge amount of effort. The very idea of walking to the clothesline, hanging them up, waiting for them to dry and then taking them down seems an insurmountable task. So environment be damned, I use the clothes dryer. Just one more way, that my mental illness is making me poor!

And even though, I get a concession on my GP and meds, I do still have a co-pay. And then of course there is the cost of the private therapist (though she has been great about reducing her fee) so I can have a therapy better designed for me, rather than the cookie cutter CBT that the public health would ram down my throat. And then the cost of the private health extras insurance to help with said therapy costs and all the other parts of my body that are falling apart...teeth, eyes ect.

Yes, I know, its hard to feel sorry for me....living in a country where the taxpayers fund such things to help me stay afloat during these periods of blackness.... I kinda want to give myself a quick kick up the backside, and pull myself up by my bootstraps like my grandparents would have. But try as I might, I can't.

So instead, I'm just messed up and broke, and hoping for the day I can figure this all out, get it fixed and go back to being a productive member of society...

In the meantime.... I am going to try to stop using the damned clothes dryer!