Received premium tax credits all year while unknowingly having Medicaid

I make barely enough to not be on Medicaid, as in ~$1,000.

I accidently applied for Medicaid indirectly, by erroneously playing around with the income levels on www.healthcare.gov . I did not even get to apply for a plan before they sent my application to my state. I cancelled that application and started a new one with the correct info and then chose my plan, received premium tax credits, called the Medicaid office in Dec 2022 and told them to cancel it. They said they couldn’t really do it due to a COVID-19 emergency mandate…most people call to get ON Medicaid, not OFF of Medicaid. They were reassuring that I would be fine as long as I do not use the Medicaid (this is if I am recalling correctly, they were very reassuring but in retrospect I think I was just talking to a low level call center employee when I should have been talking to a manager or something).

I did not think very much of it at the time. I never even received a Medicaid card in the mail (I was waiting to receive the card in the mail, I was going to call them again about it if they gave me a physical card). I thought it was cancelled and done because of this (who else was I supposed to call? they basically told me everything would be fine, they were the state government). They told me they could not cancel it so I just gave up. I make too much for Medicaid

I recently received mail talking about how I need to reenroll to KEEP my Medicaid… I have a marketplace place with BIG premium tax credits, all of 2023.

I have apparently been enrolled in Medicaid ALL 2023…I have been looking to reenroll for 2024 on healthcare.gov and happened to read the section about having Medicaid along with premium tax credits. I am a complete mess right now.

From what I am reading I have to pay back ALL premium tax credits I have received…this is not affordable to me to say the least or realistic in any sense and I have no one to turn to. I am going to lose my apartment, my health and everything I have.

I have read some things and have a few questions:

What are my options here? I called the number for healthcare.gov and the representative told me to call my state and request a “retroactive termination” of Medicaid for 2023. I did this today and they told me they cannot do this. (both the healthcare.gov employee and the state employee sounded like they were working from home, noises in the background that were inappropriate and it seemed like I was just talking to someone very low level, I asked to speak to supervisors and they said there was no one?!)

I have read about the maximum pay back here https://www.kff.org/faqs/faqs-health-insurance-marketplace-and-the-aca/whats-the-most-i-would-have-to-repay-the-irs/ Is this true? According to this I would only owe $350 for this living hell that has appeared before me. I am praying that this is true.

Reading other Reddit threads regarding this, it appears others have made this mistake…only when they called their state to cancel Medicaid, they were able to cancel it… Do I have to hire a lawyer? Would that do anything? Would it be free to hire a lawyer for this? Please, please somebody help me here. I am barely surviving and eating enough food in my apartment as is. If they take away my medicine I will perish. If I have to repay these subsidies I am looking at over $9,000 dollars… That might not seem like the end of the world for some, but this will make me homeless AND unable to repay.

I am so terrified right now. This is looking like I have just been given a death sentence.

Any help, any words, please someone has to make some sense of this. I know I should have made sure Medicaid was cancelled and I thought I did that before it even started (I called my state office, they reassured me everything’s ok, there’s a pandemic and they can’t cancel due to a mandate, I never received a Medicaid card in the mail, everything was fine, I never used Medicaid, they did not give me a card and if they did I was going to call again).

I did not use the Medicaid for two reasons. One, I have a marketplace plan, I understood you can’t use both, or even HAVE both. Two, I never received the damn Medicaid card, it was more evidence to me that they had taken me off Medicaid.

I do not have the best mental faculties to begin with. There is a reason I am stuck with the very low paying job I have, for the rest of my days. I have panic disorder/ADHD/clinical depression/a host of other physical ailments all treated with the marketplace plans for the past 3 years.

I completely regret playing around with the healthcare.gov website, I can not believe clicking around and toying with the premium tax credit calculator just to see what would happen if I were to make less or more than I make would automatically send something to my states Medicaid and end life as I know it.

I need help. I realize the law is the law. Please be kind with me while I figure out any of this. I need a list of every single option that I can possibly have. I am scared beyond words. Please help.