I'm Insured!

When I woke up this morning I had an email from Kaiser waiting for me in my inbox.

The verdict?

I'm insured!

Apparently it is possible for a young, healthy individual with no pre-existing conditions to fork over a crapton of money each month for health care coverage. Honestly I can't believe how expensive it is, I'm going to be paying over four grand a year for the privilege of continuing to never go to the doctor lol.

My choices were the $25 co-payment plan or the $30/$1500 deductible plan. Both Kaiser, since there was no way I could afford the higher deductible plans offered by Anthem or Blue Shield. Those plans have $5000-$15000 deductibles which makes the insurance pretty much useless.

With Kaiser, there's about $100 difference per month between the plans. But, if we want to have a baby in the future it seems to pay to go with the $25 co-payment plan. With the $25 co-payment plan, a pregnancy and delivery is about $500. With the $30/$1500 deductible plan the same pregnancy and delivery would be about $2500. We're only talking about maybe an $800 difference when you factor in the higher monthly cost, but E felt it was worth it for the time being.

Either way, I'm really glad that I was deemed an acceptable candidate and offered insurance. There are so many people in the US who can't get insurance either due to a pre-existing condition or inability to pay the insane premiums. I'm so thankful that E and I are in a position where we can afford(ish) to pay for decent coverage. This way if I'm ever in an accident or we do decide to add some tiny humans to our family, we won't go completely broke paying for medical bills.

5 Day Update: Gum Graft

Today was the 5th day of healing from my exciting gum graft, and I got to have an impromptu visit with my periodontist!

Two days ago I was chugging along, dealing with the annoyance of the non-dissolvable stitches ripping the crap out of my lip when...

Whoops! There goes a chunk of tissue.

Huh. Was that a piece of the graft?

It looks like a piece of the graft...

Crap.

I promptly emailed my doc the following zombie photo:

Behold! The zombie gums. Grrrrrrr...nrrrrgg....raaaawwwrrrr!

I'll pause here for a moment to say yes, my doctor gave me not only his personal email, but also his cell number. He said to call/email/text/carrier pigeon him anytime I had a question and he meant it. How awesome is that? He even complimented me on my iphone-gum-o-graph skillz. He's awesome.

So, he says everything looks normal and healthy (reeeaaallly??) but I should come in for him to check it out anyway. He fits me in that same afternoon and after circling for parking and paying $2 dollars in quarters for an hour at a meter, I'm finally in his office. Parking is definitely the one big downside of this particular office, if you can't find a spot in the 2 hours free shopping lot you're stuck with a 1 hour meter.

Now I'm sitting in his chair and I explain about the creepy chunk of tissue I spit out. He looks at the graft and says yep, that's normal. Apparently, the outer layer of the graft is supposed to come off but he didn't mention it before since it usually comes off in such tiny pieces that most people don't notice it. He was also set up to take my stitches out, but since they're not quite ready it looks like I have to wait until Friday. He did at least trim up the ends that were poking and cutting my lip which should help since they were really driving me nuts. You can actually see the cuts they made in my poor lip in the above zombie photo. Owie.

His assistant was also nice enough to make me two new palate protectors (at no cost!) which I really appreciate. They seem to get pretty gross quickly and it's great to be able to dump the old one. What's weird is that she kept mentioning that the palate protector can be used as a bleaching tray. I wasn't sure if their usual Beverly Hills clientele are naturally obsessed with bleaching and whitening their teeth, or if my teeth are looking gross and yellow enough for her to say something O_O

Gum-Numb Style (TMI)

As part of my quest to get all my medical things in order before I lose my insurance, I had the wonderful experience of gum grafting surgery yesterday morning. In general, the procedure is really common; things like genetics, braces and brushing too hard can cause your gums to recede in places, exposing the root which doesn't feel great. In my case, it seems to be a bad spin on the genetic wheel. Thanks to my sperm donor, I have had low gums in front of one of my bottom front teeth and the only way to correct it was surgery.
 

Swollen frowny face, with my good buddy, a towel wrapped ice pack. Even my nose is swollen from the palate injections :(

They numb you up, take a little piece of tissue from the roof of your mouth and sew it into place where your gum is low. The whole procedure only takes about an hour and is generally minor. In fact, the whole thing really shouldn't have been a big deal except that I happen to have inherited more unfortunately genetics, this time from my mother's side. From her side, I got both an inherited allergy to all opiate drugs and a charming resistance to Novocain!

What should have been a short, painless procedure ended up being nearly twice as long; as soon as the Novocain took effect it began wearing off and I had to get more charming injections. I also apparently have extra nerves in my mouth, which, you guessed it, required even more injections haha. My periodontist ended up giving me enough Novocain to numb a small horse, ugh. Since I've never had a cavity or dental procedure before, neither of us knew what to expect but it certainly wasn't this. For the aftermath, instead of the Vicodin that they normally prescribe, I'm taking Advil and Tylenol which I have to be very happy with since it's all I can really take. Plus, my allergic reaction to Vicodin is so so very much worse than the procedure was, I'd undergo a hundred gum grafts before taking even half a pill.

Now, I have to wait for the graft to take and for the donor site to heal. In the meantime, my mouth looks like a Frankenstein zombie creation. Gum tissue is nice and pink but your palate (the donor tissue) is actually pretty pale. Eventually the graft should blend in better and pink up once a blood supply is established. Though it'll never blend in perfectly, I don't expect many people to be looking way inside my mouth anyway.

RAWR!

Happy 3rd Birthday Roxie!

Happy Birthday to the cutest little pony in the world! 

This February Miss Roxie turned 3 and had the most fabulous My Little Pony party anyone could have dreamed up. Each party guest got to make a beautiful pony tail out of ribbon and a t-shirt with felt pony eyes. We also each got a lovely pair of sparkly wings to complete our pony look. E and I absolutely love our pony shirts, in fact we liked them so much that I came home and stitched the eyes on.

Tearing into her first present!

New leggings!

Look mom, a pony castle!

Could the birthday girl be any cuter?

Oooo a bubble maker!

Getting bunny ears, with a belly full of rainbow cake.

In addition to the awesome shirt/tail/wing ensemble, Roxie's Auntie W decorated the whole apartment with rainbows and pomanders, including a rainbow photobooth with props. We had pizza, pasta, cupcakes and a beautiful rainbow cake from one of Roxie's other faux aunties. 

I could not have imagined a more perfect pony party for such a special little girl, and E and I are so happy to be part of her life as she grows up.

Insure-Me-Woes

Like most people my age, 26 brings with it not just another year, but also the loss of... dun dun dun! Insurance! Health insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance, they're all goooooone! And just for me, my student loans and car insurance also happen to come due this month, because when it rains it pours people.

Putting aside the major suck that is going to be forking over the contents of my bank account for insurance every month, losing coverage also means I have to cram all the fun and scintillating medical procedures I don't really want to have into the next two weeks.

Since continuing my current coverage through cobra isn't an option, unless I want to pay triple individual rates, it looks like I will not be buying a separate dental or vision plan. That makes vision and dental stuff top priority to get done before I lose my coverage.

Thus far, my to do list is:

• An eye exam - No changes, all good
• Order backup glasses - Still need to do, and quickly!
• Dental cleaning - Check!
• Oral surgery consultation - Done!
• Gum graft surgery - Ugh. Next week.
• Apply for Health Insurance - Don't have any words for this one. I still haven't done it yet although I've done all the pre-work. 

 

Genetically, people on my sperm donor's side of the family have crappy mouths.  They have genetically sucky gums in the front, genetically missing teeth and a whole host of other weird dental stuff. Luckily, I've escaped almost everything. I've never had a cavity and my teeth are great, but it's become apparent that the bastard gave me his shitty gums in One tiny spot. Literally just one teensy spot while the rest are perfect. I have to have a little graft to fix it and it looks like I'll be squeezing it in just under the wire, literally days before my coverage ends. Even with the coverage I'm sure I'll still be out at least a grand, but it's better than owing the whole bill.

Now I just need to decide which insurance plan I want. It's all unnecessarily complicated - Co-payments? Deductibles? Out of Pocket Max? Do I want an HMO? A PPO? Ugh. It's all so much more expensive than it should be, and it seems that no matter how I slice it, I'll end up paying either upfront, ie month to month, or in the end, with a deductible. I've got to get a better handle on what each plan means.

Happy Birthday to me, 26 Years

For being the shortest month, February is always one of our busy ones. It's part of our three month line up of "holidays" - my birthday, Valentine's Day, our Anniversary, and E's birthday. This year, even though E was really too busy to think much about anything, he still managed to make me feel special and loved on my birthday.

He started off the day by making one of my favorite breakfasts - Belgian waffles, bacon and cheese eggs. He prepped the night before and did a beautiful job, everything came out delicious. I usually do all of the cooking in our family since I love to cook, but I could definitely get used to E making yummy things. We spent the day relaxing together and finished off the night with a phenomenal dinner at my favorite steak house, Mastro's. Mastro's is definitely our splurge restaurant, the steaks are so soft and buttery and the generous sides complement them perfectly.

Mastro's <3 br="" yum="">

To top off this birthday with a little glam, E got me the most gorgeous earrings that arrived a couple days after my birthday. They're sparkly diamond cluster studs with brilliant diamond sunburst jackets so I can wear the centers casually and the whole set for more classy events. I'm absolutely in love with them and he could not have done better.

And if I thought my birthday couldn't get any better, I had a fun and tasty dinner with a family friend at BJ's and  E and I had a third birthday dinner with my mother-in-law, step-father-in-law and another family friend.   Although I'm sure all this delicious food isn't helping my waistline, I could not feel more loved and appreciated by E and our families and friends.

E, I love you so much. Thank you for making my birthday so special. I can't wait to spend the next 74 with you.