Dear Mr. Congressman,

My name is Myrtle Poor. I have worked hard all my life until health problems began to take their toll. I graduated college with a degree in counseling. I am also a writer and a poet. I have done many other jobs as well…cooking, factory, hospital, even crisis hot line volunteering. I would never have thought my life would have changed so dramatically.

After several surgeries on my legs, followed by complications, I am now bedfast and have been so for the last 4 or 5 years. About 4 years ago I had to have a rod put in my left leg, and with this came more complications..a wound that would not heal until this year. I am unable to walk or stand on my own.

I am writing this letter to you today because I heard that President Obama is wanting to cut some of the Medicare/Medicaid funding. I have to tell you that this scares and worries me tremendously as well as others in my same situation. Right now I able to live at home with my husband because of the help provided by home health and advantage programs. Programs provided by Medicare that allow me to have someone come in my home and give me the personal and medical care I need on a day to day basis. With these programs I can live a semi-normal life at home…without these programs I fear I would die in a nursing home. Without this help I fear many of us would end up in a nursing home. I understand that President Obama wishes to have families care for their elderly, but what if you have no family to care for you?

With the economy the way it is and so many losing their jobs or on unemployment, how can they be expected to provide this kind of care? I think that you will see more elder abuse than ever before. Are nursing homes the answer? Only as a last resort. I had to go to a nursing home for rehab after one of my surgeries, and I have to tell you that I would have been better off at home alone. You are forced to lay in your own feces and urine until someone has time to come change you and your bed, and that could be several hours. Several hours which allow for bed sores and uncalled for infections. Your life is no longer your own. You are left at the mercy of others, and for the most part stripped of most, if not all of your dignity.

I’m sorry, but is this what we have to look forward to in our “Golden Years”? With every paycheck we ever received we paid for Medicare. We paid for this time when we would need this kind of help. This is a time in life that you should be able to sit back, relax and spend what time you have in peace. We should not have to worry whether or not funding will be cut. We should not have to go to bed afraid every night wondering which programs will suffer. Will it be my meal on wheels which provides the food I can no longer afford, the providers who allow me to live in my own home with respect and dignity, my medicines, my doctor visits and God forbid that I should have to go to the hospital. But we can’t! We have to live in fear each day of what the government decides is best. Best for who, please tell me? Best for the government, economy or best for the people. Most of us on Medicare and Medicaid are a poor people. We don’t have a great amount of money to pay for this kind of care on our own. I understand that it costs a lot to provide these programs. But I also know the government is funding other programs with billions of dollars that do not provide for the people.

All I am asking is please if you have to make funding cuts, search for other nonessential programs first. Begin with programs that will not affect the care the elderly and handicapped. You know, before we got old or handicapped we were viewed as an important part of society. We paid taxes, fought wars to protect freedoms and the American way of life. What’s happened? Can you tell me? Please? Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Myrtle A. Poor