Sunday, August 16, 2009

To insure or not to insure - that is the question

Kim had asked me what kind of insurance we have now that we're in the U.S. This was a pickle I must say. Neither of us is currently employed, and until my husband's business has at least one other employee besides himself, we can't claim it as a business expense. Since he just started his business and it's in the very fledgling state, that could be a while.

In the meantime, we're paying for private/individual health insurance. My husband felt that in the past, his health care costs weren't significantly reimbursed (those incurred in the U.S.) by the Japanese health care system and that it would be best for us to just bite the bullet and get some insurance. We want to be sure our daughter is covered and *if* I should end up pregnant one of these days, we want to be sure to have good coverage. I hadn't anticipated the x-ray and MRI for my tailbone (coccyx) pain but I'm even more thankful for the health insurance now as these expensive diagnostics are covered in full (and when you can't sit comfortably that's a major problem not to be ignored if at all possible!).

Since our current plan is to stay in the U.S. until the end of the year, we're expecting to pay for insurance for just about 6 months. After that, we'll be back in Japan and we'll all be covered by Japan's national health care system.

There may be better health insurance options but I'm not even sure what they would be. Anyone else who does or has lived overseas (maybe esp. in Japan but not necessarily) have any suggestions?

3 comments:

  1. I'm insurance duh! All I know is that since my husband was laid off, we have state coverage for the kids. Husband and I do not have any at the moment. All I wanted was for the kids to be covered. That was my first priority.

    I hope your tailbone is OK. Sitting comfortably is VERY important.
    *HUGS*

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  2. I can't even talk about insurance these days. Ugh.

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  3. Yeah, we have an issue here. We want to be insured until we get to Sweden, where we'll be covered by the state health plan. But my husband doesn't necessarily want to work up until then. COBRA I guess.

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