Another story … it is everyone for themselves

What No One Tells You About Surviving a Natural Disaster With Chronic Illness

www.themighty.com/2017/09/hurricane-flood-natural-disaster-chronic-illness-disability  

For those who don’t follow my Facebook page, I live in Texas on the gulf coast and we were just hit by a hurricane. It made landfall hundreds of miles away, but it caused a lot of rain and I do mean a lot. My town was on the national news for receiving the most rain in the shortest amount of time, 50 inches in three days. That’s how much rain we get in an entire year, so as you can imagine, there was significant flooding. Our neighborhood was one of the few that stayed dry (though it got pretty close) so I thought staying up all night three nights in a row was the worst I was going to experience. There are a few things I didn’t think about.

Not Having Access to Medication

I had a doctor appointment scheduled during the flood event, but since the roads were under 12 feet of water I obviously didn’t make it. The office was closed so I was unable to get a prescription called in. I ran out of my most important medication and had no options for getting more. Not only was the doctor’s office closed, there were no pharmacies open either.

This is a huge problem that occurs after a natural disaster that no one talks about. Many people were in worse circumstances than I was. I’m a paranoid person so the minute the water started rising I packed an emergency bag with all my medication in it, but I was lucky because the water rose over several hours. Many of the homes flooded so fast that people were barely able to get out alive, much less with their prescription medication. Now they’re in a shelter going without because there just aren’t enough doctors to keep up with all the medical emergencies.

The Stress Takes a Huge Toll on Your Body

a street flooded after a hurricane

This was our street after the water went down. As I mentioned we had some stressful nights when the water kept rising and rising. The first night we were awake all night because the water got about two-thirds up our driveway (that doesn’t sound that high, but we are built up above the street. It was probably five or six feet of water). There were also multiple tornado warnings so we spent a lot of time huddled in the bathroom. We were on social media at 2:00 a.m. seeing our friends flood in real time. It was awful.

The second night we slept a little bit, but the third night the water came up again. My husband and I slept in shifts so we could keep an eye on the water. It was brutal on my body because I was so stressed I couldn’t relax, not to mention the sleep deprivation. I can’t remember the last time I was in so much pain.

Not Having Access to Medical Supplies

Maybe this is naive of me, but I did not realize that I wouldn’t be getting mail for weeks (as of right now, a week after the storm, there is no date set for when we’ll get mail again). I buy all my medical supplies on Amazon, and now I have no access to them. I ran out of the pads for my TENS device as well as electrodes for my Quell device. For now I’m trying to stretch my last pair of pads far beyond how they should be stretched. If I could do things over again, the minute I heard about a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico I would order all my supplies, whether I needed them or not. Because now I have no medication and my pain devices are useless. Don’t be like me, think ahead.

You Feel Helpless When It Comes Time for Recovery

cleaning up after a hurricane

This is what flood clean-up looks like. Only picture this pile in front of every house on the street. After surviving a 1,000 year flood event without a scratch, I felt guilty. So many people around us lost absolutely everything. I wanted to go out and help, but as always my body wouldn’t let me do as much as I wanted to. I was able to help clean out two flooded houses as well as do laundry for people who were flooded, but I wanted to do more. I wanted to be out there every day helping, but I couldn’t. I hate feeling helpless on any regular day, but this was far from regular. I do not want to sit around while people are struggling, but I have to.

I hope I never have to go through this again and I certainly hope that none of my readers have to experience something like this. In case you do though, keep some of these things in mind. Learn from my mistakes!

This post originally appeared on Chronic Mom.

 

2 Responses

  1. I wondered about those folks awhile ago. I think they said no one, not emergency doctors helping, temp. clinics set up or anything/anyone would prescribed schedule 2 meds during the emergency. Had to go to you reg. doctor etc. Forget going to ER’s, they don’t help to begin with. I wonder about all that medication that folks really need floating around in the houses. I was told one time by my pain specialist (I live in potential tsunami area) what could I do for meds for my emergency supplies? He said, “don’t say that to me, I didn’t hear it. You could be kicked out of clinic for asking”. A lot of suffering folks right now. Oh, I noticed an article that was celebrating the fact that methadone clinics were opening so they could get their needed meds. Great, but what about the pain patients………anyone?

  2. Thanks very much for your honesty. We are awaiting IRMA in South Florida. I did a lot of very stressful work today. Got a hold of my Pain Doctor and he was very stressed also. I was able to get a few OF my scripts 2 weeks early. I didn’t use to much just didn’t know if the pharmacy would be standing.available medication or A doctor who would still be in town in 2 weeks.. Then I was on the phone with my insurance company for way over 3 hours. Once I was able to get all parties to talk to each other, which was no easy task then I got an override for MS Contin 200mg and Oxycodone HCL 30 mg(a full months worth early. Then I was able to get a ride from a good friend who drove me and waited (all for some great pizza)to my pharmacy and even though he (the pharmacist)gave me a hard time he knows my history and he called my Doctor and I definitely had my KARMA in GREAT working order! I was so relived after waiting 3 hours(approx) at the pharmacy to fill two CLASS 2 scripts. I would like to end my story by letting you know I started at 8:30 this morning and walked out late after approximately 6pm closing time at my pharmacy. BUT PERSISTANCE paid off and Now I will not have to pick up new pain medicine for almost 1.5 months.What a relief! I can attribute IMO to LONG GOOD relationships with Doctors,Insurance and Pharmacy as well as A complete set of records at my pharmacy . ALSO I can’t say enough that persistence paid off. Not getting so frustrated that the wrong or nasty words are said. KEEP CALM, Stand your ground and always ask “What if you were in my situation. I also brought(the right amount of pills that OF course I still had) proof that I still had all my pills left was ICING on the KARMA CAKE. I believe if I didn’t have those the PHARMACY would have denied my early order override(but not sure) That helped greatly with the PHARMACY. I wish everyone the BEST of luck. Please keep calm. GOD BLESS.

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