What a relief!

Yesterday Paul asked me if I knew yet whether the insurance was paying for any of my medical bills from May/June. I hadn't checked for several days, so I decided to check last night. Paul asking me a question like that is rather unusual. Typically he never asks me anything that relates to our finances, but I've noticed over the past 6 weeks that he's been more concerned - ex. asking if we can afford to pay babysitters (yes). He's been worried that we were going to owe tens of thousands of dollars for the hospital stays that took place prior to July 1. They haven't paid anything (yet) toward any of my office visits to the MFM clinic (which started 10 weeks ago), but it was a BIG relief to see that we don't owe anything toward my first hospitalization here in Harrisburg. The bill was for over $11K, the insurance paid over $9K on July 5, and we don't need to pay the difference. This gives me hope that they will pay for the other hospitalizations that occured before we went back on Blue Shield.

They also paid part of the bill for the bloodwork I had done at Hershey in April. The weird thing is that they paid the entire bill when I had the same exact bloodwork done at our local hospital in March, but this time they said some of it wasn't covered under maternity benefits. The ironic thing is that the two places they MOST want us to go if possible are #1 the health clinic at PSU and #2 Hershey Medical (which is owned by PSU). So it's rather ironic that they are saying we owe about $200 for having the titers drawn at Hershey whereas we didn't owe a penny for having the titers drawn at our local hospital. Also, the bill would be lower if the OB nurse hadn't faxed the wrong orders to Hershey. She accidently faxed the orders from March (for both Kell and Fya) whereas the doctor had only ordered the Fya titer to be drawn in April, as we already knew at that point that Paul is also Kell negative, but I still felt some relief at seeing that they paid something toward that bill as they hadn't been paying anything for quite awhile. The original total from Hershey was for over $800 (seems outrageous for 2 blood tests, especially as the local hospital charged a fraction of that for the same 2 tests) so we could have ended up paying far more than $200.
I'm hoping they'll end up paying most of the bills. They paid for everything during the 7 months we were on this insurance in 2011, and Ian had a couple of surgeries during that time span. But even if they don't end up paying for some of the MFM ultrasounds, it's still a big relief knowing that they'll pay for the hospitalizations. Well the true relief will come when I see they've paid for ALL of the hospitalizations, but I have far more hope now that they will since they did pay for one. They still haven't paid anything towards Ian's feeding program, but I'm not worried about those bills (even though they total over $20K) because I know his Medical Assistance will cover them if the health insurance doesn't. Thus far I've paid $518 that I wouldn't have paid if we were on Blue Shield (for the ultrasound at Geisinger in February), which means that thus far it hasn't proven to be a mistake financially (since we saved $3K in insurance premiums). We shall see in the end if it was a mistake financially. Even if the medical bills total less than $3K, I still regret our decision due to the emotional stress it has caused. In the future, I will not go the cheap route with health insurance, if we have a choice and can possibly afford the more expensive option. My bigger concern regarding health insurance is that I don't know if we'll have any starting in January due to Paul graduating in December and my plans to resign in early January. Hopefully he'll be able to get a job in January that includes benefits (which would be unusual for a position that only lasts one semester).
We talked last night about Paul and the kids staying somewhere closer to the hospital one night on the weekend so that I could see the kids two times a week rather than only one time. I suggested they spend Saturday night at his aunt's house (she lives about 20 minutes away from where I am). Paul said that his advisor will be leaving for Seattle on Wednesday. So he's decided to only go to PSU three times this week (Monday-Wednesday). He's going to work from home on Thursday and come down with the kids sometime on Friday. He thought coming down on Friday/Saturday was the better option as that way Nadia can still go to church on Sunday. I agree! This past Sunday the two couples who have given Nadia rides to church the previous 3 weeks were out of town so Paul took both kids to Sunday School and children's church this past Sunday. I was glad because it was the first time in two months that Ian had been to church. Nadia went to another VBS on Sunday night.
Paul's dad came and got the kids on Monday morning so she didn't go to VBS last night and won't go tonight either. Today they'll be spending time with their cousin, Brandi, at Paul's parents' house, and on Thursday Paul's parents are taking Ian, Nadia, and Shawn to Philadelphia to go to the Please Touch Museum. I was crying last night about missing her first performance in a musical (August 10/11), especially as I don't think our camera will allow us to take THAT long of a video, but Paul said he thinks Oliver will be born before then. He doesn't think I'll actually be hospitalized another 8 weeks. We shall see. I just need to take things one day at a time. Last night I was thinking that if I don't bleed at all for the next week or so, that I might ask the doctors to reconsider their decision after Oliver's next transfusion. I'm not sure if they would actually be willing to change their minds, but it's easier for me to deal with this if I at least think there's a chance I might get to go home prior to his birth.
I had no idea when I packed my bag on July 4th that I might not be home for two months. I only packed a bag in case they were going to hospitalize me for 48 hours for a transfusion for Oliver. I keep thinking of the things I would have done had I known that I would be gone for so long such as sorting through his clothing to pack some clothes for Oliver to wear in the hospital. I also would have done some more shopping online as I can't do any online shopping here in the hospital. Thankfully, I had already done most of my shopping for him. I wish we had already gone paint shopping, but Paul is much better at selecting a paint color than I am. I'm sure he'll pick a nice shade of yellow for Oliver's room. I am going to contact some people at my church to see if they will help with moving the bookshelves from that room down to the main floor of our house. I figure the soonest that Oliver would come home would be the last week of August so as long as the nursery is ready by then we should be fine. One thing I wish I had ordered last week were the letters for his name to put on the wall. Oh well, I'll order them whenever I'm discharged, and maybe just maybe that will be before he's born. We shall see. Right now I'm counting down the days until I get to hug and kiss my sweethearts.