Catch-38

Anyone remember this Sex and the City episode, the one where Mikhail Baryshnikov asks Carrie if she wants children and when she wavers, he tells her she’s 38 and she doesn’t have long?  I hate to admit it but I think this was a large part of my deciding to try this now, at 38.  It’s just a number that stuck in my head as being “the end of the road”.  So, here I am, trying.

The last few days I’ve been having a lot of mixed feelings.  I know much of this is due to the failure of IUI #1; it’s sort of comforting to think “maybe this isn’t the right thing for me after all”.  So my head is standing still, but my body is still marching forward.  Weird, isn’t it?  Most of the day I spend thinking “I don’t know” and then my first thought when I wake up is “next week I get to do the ultrasound!” Talk about mixed messages.  It’s exhausting. 

One thing I’ve come to accept is the fact that you NEVER feel 100% sure about this stuff, or 100% happy, or 100% confident.  Women who achieve pregnancy are riddled with doubts and fears; of course I’d be feeling the same thing just trying (because I know I can still turn back and save myself a ton of $$ and heartache).  It sure is tempting to just stop.  But then my brain starts counting the days to my next IUI.  So, what do we do here?

Things got far worse and far more complicated yesterday when I spent the day yelling at Kaiser on the phone.  I had called to check up on this weird bill for $118 I got some weeks ago – supposedly it was for the Kaiser gyn appointment I had that was basically a total waste of time (she just ordered the Day 3 labs for me); I paid $30 to see her as is my co-pay, then got this bill.  So I called a couple of weeks ago about it asking why is it $150 just to see a doctor, and they said they’d put it under review, but then the lady on the phone mentioned “I do see some charges for blood tests…” and then the phone died, and I didn’t call back because I had to go out.  So, worried about this, I called back yesterday just to make sure I don’t have to pay the $118, and the lady on the phone said she sees that I owe $948 for blood tests.  Uh – what???  I exploded on her.  The blood tests were supposed to be a $10 co pay.  She said no, I’m responsible for all charges until I meet my deductible, which is $1500.  I said how is that possible, the doctor told me they were $10!  And all I needed was the TSH and she ordered about twenty tests, how can this possibly run $948???  She said it’s not their job to know my coverage, it’s my responsibility to know my coverage.  I immediately e-mailed the doctor and said how can she have ordered all these tests I didn’t need, when I thought it was all covered and now they want to charge me almost $1000.  Someone in her office called back and said according to the doctor the tests should be the $10 co pay; I said what about the deductible, and she said she didn’t know about that.  So then I called the main customer service line to lodge a complaint.  They again said it’s my responsibility to know my coverage and apparently during that first, cut-off phone call I was advised that blood tests were not covered (no, she just told me I owed some money, I freaked out, and then the phone died).  So now I just have to wait until someone gets back to me within 7-10 business days.  I know I’m out $1000 – I checked my coverage and sure enough, labs are not covered until after the deductible is met.  How this is possible is amazing to me – I just needed one lousy TSH test, and now I owe $1000.  Well, some of that I’m sure is the tests from this Monday, which I’ll happily pay for, but even then I shouldn’t owe more than a couple hundred $$, not $1000.  Had I known ANY of this I would have just had the tests done at the clinic.  I thought this was all covered!  You go on line to check your coverage and under “labs” it says $10 co-pay; office visits $30.  Nowhere does it say “after deductible”.  So, basically, every time I want to do anything at Kaiser, even see a doctor, I’d better call customer service first to see what it would cost me.  If I’d known that useless gyn appt was going to cost $150 I never would have gone; if I’d known the blood tests were going to run $948 I never would have had them run, ever.  I feel totally scammed and ripped off.  I don’t have any money right now, and this bill (for absolutely nothing) is the cost of one IUI.  So, I could have tried to have a baby with that money, and instead I have a whole lot of nothing.  I’m so angry I spent the day crying and yelling and running around like a mad, wet hen yesterday.  This is the last thing I needed right now!!!