Insurance and Gel

Josh was sitting on the deck Saturday after the MS walk. He had gotten the mail and was thumbing through the envelopes. I had already checked the mail the day before, but because it was mostly bills, I stuck it back in the mailbox and decided to check on it Monday. Have you ever done that? I am guilty. I usually just stick them back in there to deal with them later. I saw a Med Impact envelope, but I assumed it was about the prior authorization approval for the gel infusions. We received a Fed-ex package on Thursday with all of the medicine information and packing information. It is amazing the amount of marketing these meds have. In fact, you can really tell a lot about the cost of the medicine if you examine the marketing and packaging. Anyways, back to the deck. I watched Josh open the envelope and knew immediately the gel infusions were denied by insurance. I sometimes have this weird 6th sense about things. I knocked on the kitchen window and mouthed, "Is everything okay?" I got the smile that means no, but oh well. I went and got the letter and read for myself that the gel was denied. Ugh...

In my head I just said, "Let's just start the appeal process." Josh and I both agreed to keep it quiet. We had just returned from a fun time raising money and making progress toward a cure. What was the point in bringing this up? In a way, it really felt like post-vacation blues.

We contacted the neurologist Monday, and our nurse had already started the appeal process. WHAT? In the past, we have had to do the appeal and handling the insurance. I am SO thankful that this is taken care of for us. We have also heard that our doctor will personally get on the phone and really work hard to get all of the medicine her patients need. Oh how nice!!

I think all of this just proves that life goes on. March is MS awareness month. There is a ton of buzz about MS and after the month is over, it is almost like Poof! The awareness and buzz disappears. Our company went home on Sunday, and we are back to our routine. School, soccer, gymnastics, show and tell, and the list could go on and on. It would be so easy to sit back and be bummed...to be frustrated...to be fed-up, but what good would it do? Really, it would only make us a victim. I have said from the start that our family will not be victims of this. People always say-well bless your heart. Geez. That is the Southern way of basically saying- well, you're screwed. Really, though, Josh and I pretty much have it made. Just look at all of our blessings and you really wouldn't be able to argue.

As I was loading pictures of the walk, I found this one. Do you know how hard it is to get 3 kids looking at a camera like they want to????


 I mean, how could anyone be down when you have these 3 kiddos? They really make life awesome!