Billed $2000 for talking about suicide

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my suicide hospital bill ended up being something like $11,900. good thing insurance covered it.

Such a scam if you ask me. Considering I didn't want the treatment, nor needed it, nor benefited from it..

Yes, I don't think many people understand the severity of others' problems.

As for the bills, we live in a society of Machiavellian leeches. If we can learn to find the nice companies -- say, through a large-scale company directory with advertising feedback -- then we can put an end to this piling deception once and for all.

In 1998, I was in a car crash in Roseville, a suburb that is known for corruption. I had a bruise on my chest from the seat belt, and I had trouble breathing because of it. I told the paramedics that I was refusing treatment. They told me that it was illegal to refuse treatment, strapped me to a board, and took me to the local hospital, where I spent several hours immobilized on a gurney in the ER, despite the fact that I had not complained of neck pain. After that, I got bills totaling around $1000. I told them to bill it to Medicare (via my father's plan) and they said no, they wanted cash, and they would send me to a collection agency unless I wrote a check. It took a month of fighting with them before they took Medicare. It was all a scam to extract money from me-the paramedics alone cost $600.

I was really angry, especially after I had to appear in court on charges of breaking traffic laws-I had rear ended another car due to ADHD. I had to plead with the judge to not throw me in jail. That was an extra $100 in fines. All they wanted was money. They wanted to treat me so they could get money. They wanted to threaten me with a few months in jail so they could get more money. The judge really liked having people grovel before him. I tried to be as professional as possible, I even wore an old suit that I had.

I guess this mean if you're suicidal don'ask for help, shot a bullet in your head.
Happily I'm living in Canada.

Don't they have any urgent care places in your area, Elderwanda? I find them very useful if you just want to get checked out on a weekend and don't really feel it's an emergency, and it's cheaper. It's more like a "regular" doctor visit.

OMG, I just got done telling you guys that I wouldn't do anything stupid. But guess what happened today? I was on the phone with this bueracrat and I won't even bother telling you WHY I thought he was a bueracrat, just that I got pissed off and basically gave him a big "f**k you" Only instead of actually saying "F**k you" I made a [sarcastic] suicide threat and hung up since he was giving me thr runaround about getting my zoloft and I wanted to be in the right context.

I had no idea that cops would actually show up, then the fire department, then finally the paramedics. I basically told them that I had a huge outburst and even though I HAD to go to some kind of hospital, I got out the same day with a 50mg dose of zoloft just to stay on the safe side. I was 100% cooperative and I really didn't want to end up owing $2000 since this wasn't the VA.

I learned my lesson when I thought I could walk back to the house, it didn't seem very far away. I must've asked for directions 5 different times, taken every long cut, plus it went from sunny to straight up pouring. I think this is revenge for all the bad things I say about God, or just the most memorable birthday ever.

But for future reference:

[back-paddle (I'm stressing this one the most) + cooperate = not getting committed]

See, you all know what I'm talking about! It's like the government wants to get rid of people who even think about suicide.

Why? I can think of an answer: Christianity. Rather than thoughtfully considering voluntary euthanasia and other solutions to the problem of human suffering, the government might be full of closed-minded Christian torturers who want to exterminate anyone who is brave enough to contemplate the ethics of suicide within a state of suicidality... and who know that such a suicidal person is capable of discovering an argument that allows him or her to write a book to expose a barbaric flaw in our cultural mores.

"Oh, no!" the government shouts. "We want to keep them stupid!"

So in 1971 (the same year Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was produced), Maxine Baker wrote, "In the name of mental health, we deprive them of their most precious possession: liberty." Aww, how sweet.

Now, you could say that there isn't a government plot to squash enlightened revolts against Christian torturer-dogma, but I then ask: Why would they bill the patient instead of taking it out of American tax dollars? If you pay $500 a month for quality insurance, you can avoid that, but say you're forced to work minimum wage? You can still write a book, you know, especially if the government only took measures to make you stupid after early intellectual accomplishments.