Health coverage after losing my job: marketplace or Medicaid? - what worked for you?

My family's coverage ended with the layoff and we have a prescription we cannot skip. It has been weighing on me all week. The COBRA notice arrived with a very high price. How fast did coverage start?

Thanks for writing this out. I went through something close to it 9 months ago, and it settled down once I kept a simple log of every call and form.

A free navigator at a community health centre walked me through my options. It took an hour and saved me a lot of guessing.