You've got to be KIDDING me...

I don't know if the stars aren't lined up for me, or if the planets are out of whack, but I've had quite a few strange things happen lately...

Yesterday I got a shock to my system that reduced me to tears. I finally got a dr. appointment for Autumn w/ a pediatrician. I had to wait for my insurance to kick in and then get the card in the mail and then find someone in-network. My dad told me to go to the pediatrician that my brothers used to see when they were kids. So I called and scheduled an appointment for Wednesday at 10:00. I left work at 9:15, drove to the day care, got Autumn, and went to the dr. It's a super nice office with a GORGEOUS sea/jungle mural on all of the walls. So we get called back, the nurse is super nice, she asks me a bunch of questions, Autumn gets weighed and height measured, and then she has me wait for the dr.

Weight: 24 lbs. 2 oz (87th percentile)
Height: 31 1/2 inches (97th percentile)

The pediatrician came in and was really nice. He explained the 4 immunizations they were going to give her, asked a bunch of questions about her development, etc. He even remembered Nick & Nate. After he left, the nurse came back and gave Autumn 4 shots. I was smart, planned ahead, and had given her some motrin when I picked her up at day care, so she only cried for about one minute and then was perfectly fine as if nothing had happened.

I got her dressed and we went out front to do our $30 copay. It took a few minutes for them to tell me how much it cost and they asked me to sit in the waiting room while they called my insurance and they'd be right with me. I started to worry that something wasn't right, but I brushed it off thinking it was just that I was a new patient. Boy, was I wrong...

The billing lady came out and told me that my insurance doesn't cover wellness visits (EXCUSE ME, WHAT???) and that I haven't met my $1,000 deductible yet, so the total cost of my visit would be $700!!! I felt my cheeks flush to a bright red and I started blinking fast to fight back the tears. $700? Did I hear that right? She said she was so sorry to have to tell me that and said they would split it up into payments for me. She asked how much I could pay today and assured me she would still submit it to my insurance company so we could see how much of a discount they would give me since the pediatrician was in-network.

I paid, got out to the car, and just started bawling. I'm a single, divorced mom who can't even afford my own apartment (I can't even begin to express how grateful I am to my parents for letting Autumn and I live with them, or else I'll burst into tears again...plus, that's a whole different blog post in and of itself). There is NO WAY I can afford an extra $700 for a stinkin' dr. visit.

I'm upset about 2 things: 1) what type of insurance company doesn't cover wellness visits? That's the most backward thing I've ever heard of! Wellness visits help catch and PREVENT illness early, which ultimately saves the insurance company money. I'm paying around $400 a month for insurance coverage for Autumn and I for what? Just to have to turn around and pay a $700 bill?

2) I am upset that the dr.'s office would charge $700 for 4 shots and a 20 minute visit. I know it's a business for them and they have to make a living, and if you're getting insurance to pay most of that $700, that's fine. But to ask a single divorced mother to pay $700 out of pocket is rediculous. I don't have an itemized list of what the costs were for yet, but I could have easily gone to the county clinic and gotten 4 shots for $20 each. I would much rather pay $80 than $700. How much are they marking those shots up to? How much is that dr charging for a wellness visit?

I'm just so frustrated and shocked that it was so much. I'm slowly coming to terms with it and just hoping that the insurance company will have a big discount since the pediatrician is in-network and that the dr's office will work with me on lowering the cost since I'm paying for it out of pocket. Anyways, I know there are worse things that could happen, but this just was a shock.

Then, after I dropped Autumn off and was headed back to work, I almost ran into a big old cardboard box in the middle of the road. I had to slam on my brakes, b/c I didn't know if there was something in the box. I decided to be a good samaritan and got out and put the box in my car so that the wind didn't blow it into the road for someone else to have to slam on their brakes.

By this time, I'd been gone for 2 1/2 hours, so I stopped at Arby's real quick to grab some lunch and they messed up my order. And silly me, I didn't look at my order until I got to work. But by this time I just didn't care anymore.

Then when I got back to work, there was some drama there that just compounded all my stress.

Today I got to work and things were going fine until one of the technicians called in to let us know he had been in an accident. Usually, it's just a fender bender and not a huge deal. This wasn't...the tech was OK, but he had to have his truck towed, we had to reschedule all of his stops for the day, and he had no way to get back to work. So, I volunteered to go pick him up in Mesquite (about 25 miles away). I got 20 miles into it and the office called to say they were just going to tow the truck back to the office and the tech would catch a ride with the tow truck guy. That was a fun little waste of expensive gas.

When I got back, we found out that our west side office had shut down the phone lines already (we are moving offices) so we had 30 messages on an answering machine in that office that we didn't know about and needed to take care of.

The last and final thing that topped of my string of weird events was a phone call. Without going into too much detail, the customer did not want to pay a cancellation fee and he said, "If you charge my credit card for this, I will blow up your building!!!" I didn't take the call, but when I found out about it, I called the customer back to see if he was serious or not. He said he was upset and just wanted to make it clear that we are NOT to charge his credit card. I assured him we wouldn't, but he never said he was sorry or that he was just kidding. I'm not too worried about it, b/c some people are just ignorant and say stupid things.

Anyways, it seems like I'm complaining and focusing on the negative. I'm not trying to, it's just that a lot of strange and off the wall things happened in such a short amount of time. Since my word for the year is happiness, I'm going to look at things like this:

$700 dr bill: At least I have a healthy daughter that is the light and love and joy of my life.
Cardboard box in road: No damage to my car, and I was able to do an anonymous act of service for others
Messed up order: They got most of the order right, and I have always had enough food to eat
Drama at work: I have a job that allows me to work with fun people
Go pick up tech: It was very nice to have a quiet 40 minute car ride by myself
30 messages: Gave me something to keep me busy for an hour and make the day go by faster
Blow up building threat: After that phone call something really FUNNY happened and I laughed so hard I was crying. It completely broke the tension of the past few days and made the rest of the day breeze by.

It really hasn't been that bad (except for the $700) and I am glad that there's some bumps in the road to make me appreciate when there are smooth parts. I'm excited it's almost Friday and then it will be the weekend. I love the weekends, b/c then I get to spend all day Saturday and Sunday with my little Autumn Bottom. And bonus...it's the Superbowl on Sunday! So yeah for random and crazy events that keep life exciting.