Gees! What a ride!

When illness takes over, it’s not just the seriousness of the illness that affects a person and their family.

It changes everything.

Time away from work.
Loss of income.
Medical appointments.
Specialists.
Medications.
Travel.
Treatment costs.
Changes to childcare.
Loss of independence.
Loss of your ability to function.

And sometimes, the loss of the person you were before you became sick.

The emotional toll is enormous.

But then there is the financial toll — and the toll it takes on your family.

And this is where something feels deeply, fundamentally wrong.

Because what happens when you cannot afford to get well?

What happens when the treatment you need is available — but you simply can’t afford it?

WHAT THEN?????

When the specialist who could help you is privately funded.

When the medication that could change your life costs more than you can you could dream to afford.

When you’re too sick to work, but not sick enough to receive the support you desperately need.

When you spend your savings.

Then your family’s savings.

Then you borrow.

Then you fundraise.

Then you create a Givealittle page and put your private, painful circumstances online, hoping strangers will care enough to help keep you alive or give you a chance at a better quality of life.

And what if they don’t?

Does that somehow prove I’m not worth it?

That my life isn’t worth the cost?

That I’m not valuable enough to save?

I know that sounds harsh.

But these are the kinds of thoughts that can creep in when the system makes you feel like your health has a dollar value attached to it.

And I have to ask:

Could you survive this?

Could your family?

Because this is the reality many New Zealanders are facing when serious illness enters their lives.

WHY DO WE HAVE TO DO THIS?

Why have we normalised crowdfunding healthcare?

Why are ordinary New Zealand families expected to publicly ask strangers for money to access medical treatment?

Why can’t we simply have a healthcare system that provides the care ALL people need?

What are the barriers?

And, more importantly, how do we overcome them?

There’s another part of this that I think is incredibly difficult to understand unless you have lived it.

You will never truly understand serious illness — and all the complicated issues that follow it — until you experience it yourself.

Especially as a typical, everyday working Kiwi who can’t afford private health insurance.

Because being seriously unwell while working is a completely different reality.

You have built your life around being able to work.

You have no choice.

You have a mortgage or rent.

Children.

Food.

Power.

Transport.

Insurance.

Everyday expenses that don’t stop simply because your body does.

You may have spent years working, contributing, paying taxes, supporting your family and doing everything you were supposed to do.

And then suddenly…

You become the person who needs help.

Your income disappears.

Your capacity disappears.

But the bills don’t.

They actually get BIGGER.

Now you have medical costs on top of everything else.

The healthcare system doesn’t suddenly become easier to navigate either.

It becomes more confusing.

More appointments.

More referrals.

More waiting.

More paperwork.

More questions.

More uncertainty.

And your responsibilities don’t magically disappear because you’re unwell.

You can go from being an independent, working person to desperately needing support — while simultaneously feeling guilty that you’re no longer contributing in the way you once did.

And that can be fucking brutal.

And I’m not saying this because I have simply read about it or heard stories from a distance.

I have experienced it.

And what makes it even more confronting is that I see it rampant throughout my own small circle of friends and family.

People who have worked.

People who have contributed.

People who have paid taxes.

People who have spent their lives looking after their families and doing everything they were told they should do.

And then illness happens.

Suddenly, everything changes.

They’re not just dealing with the illness.

They’re dealing with the financial, emotional, practical and social consequences that come with it.

I see people struggling to access care.

I see people worrying about money.

I see delayed treatment.

I see families stretching themselves beyond what they can realistically afford.

And I see people feeling like a burden simply because they have become sick.

And if this is happening so frequently within my small circle of friends and family…

WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING OUTSIDE OF MY CIRCLE?

If I can see this much happening around me, what is happening across New Zealand?

How many other families are quietly dealing with this?

How many people are choosing between treatment and putting food on the table?

How many are delaying care because they simply cannot afford it?

How many are working themselves into the ground while sick because they cannot afford to stop?

How many are living in poverty because illness has taken away their ability to work?

How many people are sitting at home feeling like a burden because they can no longer financially or physically contribute to their family?

How many people are reaching a point where they genuinely believe their family would be better off without them?

What are we not seeing?

What are people quietly enduring behind closed doors?

What the actual fuck is happening to us?

Imagine being so sick that you are already struggling to survive physically, while simultaneously watching your illness drain your family’s finances, strength and wairua — spirit.

Imagine lying awake thinking:

“How much is this costing?”

“How long can we keep doing this for me?”

“Would everyone be better off without me?”

That is the part that scares me the most.

Because when people cannot afford the care they need, the “choices” can become horrifying.

Some people may reach a point where they believe their options are to continue living with severe illness and poverty, watching their family struggle alongside them…

or to stop being a financial burden.

That isn’t really a choice.

That’s what happens when a system leaves someone without a viable alternative.

I have just made a decision to cancel a doctors appointment for pain, as I can’t afford the $19.50 at the moment.

No one should ever have to weigh up the financial cost of their existence, quality of life or to be out of pain due to money.

No parent should have to wonder whether their children would be better off without them because they are sick.

No child should have to watch their parent decline because the treatment they need is financially out of reach.

And no family should have to choose between keeping the lights on and keeping someone they love alive.

So I have questions.

WHY do we need platforms like Givealittle to fund essential healthcare?

Also how many admin fees do they need? (For example, $2.50 per donation x 200 donations is $450.00, is that acceptable????). Making money off the poor, disabled, struggling or unwell?) blurk!!!!! maybe I’m wrong, if I am please let me know and I will delete that portion….

Sorry I got off track…..

Why aren’t we putting more energy into fixing the healthcare system itself?

Why are people waiting months, sometimes years, for treatment while their conditions worsen?

Why are people forced into private healthcare because the public system cannot provide timely care?

Why does access to treatment seem to depend so heavily on what you can afford?

And pharmaceutical companies…

How do you sleep at night?

How can an industry make enormous profits from medicines that people literally need to stay alive, while knowing there are people who cannot afford them?

How can we accept a world where someone can be dying from an illness, have a treatment available, and still be unable to access it because they simply don’t have enough money?

At what point does a human life become more important than a profit margin?

I would genuinely love someone to answer these questions.

Not with political spin.

Not with corporate language.

Not with statistics that make the situation look better on paper.

I want someone to actually explain:

Why is this acceptable?

Why is this the system we have created?

Why are ordinary working New Zealanders expected to financially survive serious illness while simultaneously trying to get well?

And why, when the system fails, are we expected to turn to strangers for help?

I know healthcare is complicated. But I also believed my taxes helped with that…. But now I know that’s not actually the case.

I know resources are finite.

And I know doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers are doing incredible work under enormous pressure.

This isn’t about blaming the people on the frontline.

It’s about questioning a system that seems to have accepted that some people will simply fall through the cracks.

Because illness is already fucking hard enough.

You shouldn’t have to fight the illness and the system.

You shouldn’t have to fight for treatment.

You shouldn’t have to fight for funding.

You shouldn’t have to fight to prove that your life is worth the cost of saving it.

And you certainly shouldn’t have to become poor and lose everything – to stay well or alive.

Our health should not be determined by our bank balance.

Our lives should not have a price tag.

And being sick should never leave someone believing that the most compassionate thing they can do for their family…

…is disappear.

THAT is the choice we should never be asking people to make.