...... Six months after we said I love you, Raghav was dead. I was told his death was an accident—self-medicating gone wrong. When the pills weren’t working, Raghav drank in an effort to numb his inescapable pain. I’m convinced he’d still be here if he had health insurance to get the care he needed. At his funeral, I finally met Jake, the Bernie Bro I swore I’d never speak to.

About 45,000 people in the US die every year from not having insurance. Sometimes the causes are obvious—a lack of insulin or a cancerous tumor that goes unchecked. But there are also more insidious, cumulative circumstances that lead to the same conclusion. One morning Raghav didn’t wake up, and he never would again.

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I didn’t grieve alone. Raghav’s Bernie Bro friends were not a bunch of sexists after all. Some were socialist feminist women, some were great guys. In the months that followed Raghav’s death, they made sure I ate and didn’t isolate myself. We’ve since stayed up till 3 a.m. working on jokes and talking a lot about Bernie Sanders. This weekend, all of us, including Jake, are heading to New Hampshire to canvass for Bernie, the only 2020 candidate who unequivocally supports for Medicare for All. I’m one of the bros now, I guess.

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I used to think supporting Sanders would also somehow make me less of a feminist. Now I know that couldn’t be further from the truth—my feminism needs to fight for women who don’t have $500 a month to spend on health insurance premiums, for single moms working three part-time jobs and still not making ends meet, for women who can’t leave an abusive marriage because her insurance is tied to her husband’s job. In 2016, I thought Bernie was prioritizing economic issues over women’s issues—now I understand that they’re connected.