Stomach pain, bleeding as a result of the inflammation and persistent nausea soon became a regular part of Bell’s day. Plus, he couldn’t afford the regular chiropractic care which helped keep his symptoms at bay. As the holidays passed and the reality of a long, cold winter without a job and with little positive response from recruiters, Bell’s flare-ups worsened, particularly his iron levels as he lost blood, and required intravenous iron infusions. While Bell was doing that, he scored two interviews, both of which ended very promisingly, but didn’t result in work. Bell said that having his hopes soar, peak and then ultimately dashed by those two interviews caused his symptoms to rage even further out of control.
A phone call offering freelance work offered, at long last, some relief of symptoms. “The first day of work I felt better than I had in months,” said Bell. “My symptoms have improved drastically since the first day back, with most of them having subsided completely. I can state with 100 percent certainty that the decline in my health was directly related to my period of unemployment and the financial uncertainty and stress that comes with it.”
Frankly speaking
Matthew Vondras of Clinton Corners described his ordeal. “It sucked,” said Vondras, who was laid off from his job as an architect with several others due to industry’s decline and his company’s lack of work. Though he knew there was not much work out there for architects, the decision began to undermine and question his own self-worth. “Out of all these people, why me? Am I that bad at what I do?”
Lack of sleep, eating poorly, increased running around and the stress of not being able to pay for basic needs, like food … it all started to ebb at Vondras’ health and esteem. Vondras said he was experiencing stomach ailments, as well as back and foot pain from walking rather than driving. “Not to mention, depression,” he added. Vondras said his new lifestyle of hustling around for college and being completely broke lead to not taking very good care of himself. If something came up that needed medical attention, there was no insurance or money to take care of it. “I got kidney stones in the middle of my final semester … But not from ‘sitting around’, like some people accused me and others of. You go from sitting behind a desk, to running all over the place, jumping through all kinds of hoops to find another job. I worked more hours looking for work than I did actually working.”
Marilyn Fino of Milton said that sometime after she lost her job of 14 years, she took her aggressions out on the weeds in the garden, resulting in a lovely garden and crushing pain. “The next day I could barely move, and spent at least six weeks with serious back issues, which flare up to this day,” she said. “After that, I developed heart rhythm problems. I’m sure it was related to my job loss because when I started working again, they went away. I’m sure I experienced some unacknowledged depression as well. There were medical expenses to go with it — co-payments for doctor visits, physical therapy, medical tests, and gas and bridge tolls. Thankfully, I had medical insurance and a husband with a pension because unemployment didn’t pay much.”
