My name is David M. Durard. I’m 61 years of age and a lifelong resident of Tennessee. My wife Carla J. Durard and I have been married 43 years. We are tax paying citizens of Dickson County, and we’ve lived in the community of Dull, (outside Charlotte) where we have owned a home for 25 years.
The reason for writing this, is the address our elected officials (local and statewide) and to raise awareness to not only our plight, but the plight of thousands or working poor Tennesseans who have no health insurance. Some of the political names that come to mind are Congressman Jim Cooper, Lamar Alexander, State Reps David Shepard and Mary Littleton, Senator Kerry Roberts and Governor Bill Haslam. I would like to issue a challenge to them. I would ask them to exist for a year or two without their perks and lavish benefit packages, and basically try to survive on what the working has to deal with on a daily basis. The apathy of our taxpayer funded “Let them eat cake” attitude brings to mind Ebenezer Scrooge, when he uttered the phrase “If they are going to die, then let them do so, and decrease the surplus population”.
The sheer torture one experiences when in great pain is a reality many of us have to live with daily. It appears that our elected officials have chosen the almighty dollar over health care for the working poor. We need help! Please … get off your collective good intentions, your duffs or anything else your sitting on, and accomplish something for the nearly 400,000 people who can’t afford medicine, doctor visits, or necessary surgeries!
Last year my wife fell and broke her arm at the wrist. The community clinic could not set it. We were referred to places else where in the county, and as hard as this may be for you to believe, the best help she was able to obtain was a large prescription for Lortabs, and a cast put on without setting her arm. Removed a few days later because of the pain. Her arm knitted like that at a horrible angle. She self medicated with Ibuprofen and braces purchased at Wal Mart.
Two years ago she fell and fractured her knee. We self doctored again, “after the run around”, with the same procedure. You can’t be a sissy and get old in Tennessee, if you are the working poor. got an impacted tooth? Take 2 aspiring! Need eyeglasses or cataracts removed? We don’t have anything for you. Homeless and/or mentally ill ? Better get the cake out again, we need that money to spend on our mideast wars and our aid to the countries that have vowed to put an end to our western way of life.
We have applied for ‘Obama Don’t Care’ and ‘TN We Could Care Less’ for two years now with no luck. With what we make $900 a month is not affordable. I have a hernia the size of Tennessee. I’ve had it a year and a half. I’ve become good friends with a hernia belt, tied with elastic bandages from front to back, and a good ole fashioned pair of suspenders to hold it all up. It just don’t get no better than that. Next time y’all are havin’ a heart attack, a broken tail bone, or some other disfigurin’ life alterin’ event, come on down to old Doc Dave’s. Maybe he can show ya how tax payin’ voters, rugged men and women and the workin’ poor learn to deal with situations like that!
We live in the strongest country on earth, but history will judge us on how well we took care of our poor, our elderly, and our sick. There is simply no good reason why any American should live like so many do. to the powers that be: Please stop bickering over silly partisan crap! Do what you were elected to do, or step down and let someone else have a turn at the wheel. By the way. Good old Doc Dave is open seven days a week. Bring a bullet to bite on if I gotta set a broke leg or take out an appendix, surprise yourself, be tuff, I know ya can do it. God bless us, everyone.
Please call, write, or email these folks, let them know who we are. They will love you for it!
David M. Durard
Charlotte, TN
The S. C. Advocate’s Letters to the Editor contain the expressed and sole opinion of the writer. They do not necessarily express the opinion of the paper’s Editor or staff, nor have the “facts” contained in them been checked.