Relief.

Last night was the second time in my life that I've been moved to tears by the news.

I've been a lot quieter about this issue than I have with others in the past. I'll debate social injustice and women's rights until I'm blue in the face. But this? This is personal. Deeply personal.

I've been living a ticking time bomb on the whole insurance front for a few years. I'm lucky enough to be under my dad's insurance and for the most part it's treated me fairly. Because it didn't have a choice. Soon, though, when I turn 24, things are going to get a lot more complicated. I can Cobra his insurance for a little while at an exorbitant rate. I can try to find a corporate job that I desperately don't want and forsake my own goals and dreams just for a policy. Or I can join the ranks of millions who walk around uninsured.

Except, when you have a chronic illness, that's not really an option. The medicine I take weekly costs thousands. My procedures cost even more. And if I wind up needing surgery (which I likely will in the next few years), I could kiss my entire future livelihood goodbye. All because insurance agencies have no one to answer to. They have no mercy or compassion.

And I really didn't think this day would come--the day when the huge weight felt lifted from my shoulders, when I felt truly free to explore my options for the future.

Opponents of the bill love to throw that word around. Freedom. Yesterday a local representative said the country had lost a little bit of it with the vote. I didn't hear what she said next but I'm betting the word "socialism" made an appearance.

I guess there are different interpretations of what it means to be free. I don't understand how a totally uninvolved government is the answer. I also don't understand how the same people who equate freedom with an uninvolved government often think the government should interfere with same-sex couples' rights to marry. When is it interference, and when is it for your perceived-greater good?

To me, freedom means that I can marry Jason in May. (I was going to go along with the wedding and secretly not make it legal so that I could still Cobra my parents' insurance. Jason has his own company and therefore his own insurance policy that would never take on someone like me.) Freedom means that I can pursue the career that I want, without having to take my health in as a factor. Healthy people can pick and choose what they do with their lives--shouldn't people with illnesses be afforded the same luxury? Freedom means that even though I have a chronic illness I will be treated the same as my healthy peers. Freedom means I can find a policy that is fair, despite the battles ahead of me.

Freedom, to me, means that the 32 million Americans who couldn't get health insurance can now take their families to the doctor. Crohn's Disease is nothing. The people who need insurance the most--the people who are the sickest--are the ones left in the dust. In what world is that freedom?

During the House debates last night I heard a Republican representative say the bill was unfair to our children, to future generations. That we were saddling them with irreversible debt.

Now that I have a member of that future generation in my household, I can say that I feel complete and total relief about the America she'll be growing up in. I think the Congressional Budget Office is right, that the bill will eventually help heal that debt, not cause it. I feel like I can breathe a little easier knowing that Adelyn will grow up in a country that will not forsake her if she ever, God forbid, gets sick at the wrong time. If she ever, God forbid, gets diagnosed with a chronic illness like her mom. She will only have to weather the stress of the illness, not the stress of how to take care of it.

That is the America I want my daughter growing up in, not a country that tosses the weak aside for the sake of "limited" government.

I know it's not a done deal yet, but last night felt so monumental I can't help but feel victorious. Because of last night, I can get married legally. I'll have somewhere to turn when my insurance company decides they've had enough of me. I won't be left to make the decision between taking care of my health and avoiding bankruptcy.

And my battle is only one of millions. Millions that are worse. Life-threatening. It's a victory for the American people, including Adelyn, who stared wide-eyed at the TV last night, completely oblivious, as the House floor erupted into cheers.

It's a victory even for those who say they oppose it. I have yet to come across someone who opposes the bill who is sick and uninsurable. And I have a feeling those who oppose it have not yet been faced with the torturous situation of having a sick loved one who can't get the help they need.

Now, hopefully, they'll never have to.

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