I can do it when I put my mind to it!

I am doing a happy dance because I work full time, run my own trans clinic, am married, a Father, I play sports on the weekends, had someone cut into my penis during finals and I still got an A in my economics class!

The sky isn't the limit... the universe is my playground!

I survived... my first week of accounting!

Yup my title said it. I survived my first week of accounting and I did better than I thought. I still have about 6.5 weeks to go in the course but I am optimistic espcially because for the most of the week my mind was preoccupied wondering whether my surgeon called my insurance and/or what was their decision. Sine I have that answer I can now focus my energy on other things such as passing this accounting course.
Speaking of which I have homework to do!

Quick - 5/6/10 update

Lower surgery and Insurance

I called the insurance office today and surgeon hadn't called yet. I called the surgeon's office and surgeon was in surgery BUT surgeon had it in top of the desk to do first thing when out of surgery.

I will follow up tomorrow.


Education

I got all the financial aid stuff finished for my Master's progam *Does happy dance".
I was able to accept my financial Aid package and now I am OFFICIALLY registered for my first course which starts soon. I already got a head start on the reading!


Conferences

It looks like I will be going to the Empire Conference, Philly Trans Health Conference AND SCC this year.
If any of you readers are going to be at any of these let me know so we can meet up and hang out!


I hope I can post tomorrow about my insurance response and hopefully I will be celebrating having booked a surgery date!

Productive day!

Education/Loans

I resolved a mistake that was made with an old student loan I had. The loan people were very apologetic since it was their error and they let my MBA program know that the error was corrected. I also was able to successfully get everything in for my Financial Aid for my Master's program so soon everything should be set!


Conferences

I am going to the Empire conference in Albany and The Philly Trans Health conference . So I had to finalize my arrangements related to both of those. I also had to start thinking about whether or not I would be going to SCC this year and submitted the appropriate stuff for that. Chances are I will be there too. Those are my 3 conferences for the year. I may try and squeeze in Gender Odyssey BUT that all depends on surgery stuff.

Lower surgery

I called my insurance today since I was told the surgeon would call yesterday for the "peer to peer medical review". My insurance said that the surgeon's office and them have a conference time set for Tomorrow! *Does happy dance* When I asked the guy how long it takes for them to make the decision he stated "peer to peer medical review" is fastest and the decision will be given to the surgeon at the end of the conversation and within 7 days both the surgeon's office and myself will get the decision officially in writing for our records.
So tomorrow is a BIG day!


I Got mail... AGAIN!

I opened the mailbox and once again there was a letter from my insurance. I took a deep breath and opened it. It was a statement regarding my hysto saying that they paid the anesthesiologist. That made me smile because though insurance can say whatever they want when it comes to paying stuff it is never final until they actually PAY!

My insurance company makes no sense and other happenings

The title explains it exactly! THEY MAKE NO DAMN SENSE! I got a letter today from my insurance company. When I opened the letter it was from the department that covers "inpatient" stays. The letter basically says that they will not certify for me to stay in the hospital overnight after bottom surgery. When I read further it states that "The proposed procedure is normally performed on an outpatient/short-stay (ambulatory) basis and there is no documentation of a medical condition that would warrant an inpatient level of care". ARE THEY SERIOUS! This is freaking crazy! It is okay for insurance to cut into my penis and remix stuff but they can't keep me in the hospital overnight?! They pulled this mess with my hysto. For my hysto I was fine with it because I know people who had the surgery and went home the same day. That is the beauty of that hysto technique. This is a different ball game!
I think part of the issue is that the procedure is being requested for coverage by the codes and the individual codes are done as outpatient procedures INDIVIDUALLY but these are being done all at once which I think requires a little more than me just getting up and walking out after surgery!
The letter does go on and tell me how to appeal and send further documentation and that they respond within 15 calendar days which is a plus. This letter was also sent to the surgeon's office the date says 4/13/10 so I don't know if that was the letter that the surgeons office got before when they asked me to get the documentation from my local doc and stuff but I will call them tomorrow and see.
To be honest I am not worried because when I requested authorization for me to get T shots covered by my insurance they denied me. I wrote a letter my doc completed some form and now my T is covered til 2014 at which point I will just have to get re-approved.
I think it will all work out but now I have to spend tomorrow on the phone probably between insurance and the surgeon's office which would be fine if it weren't Friday and I wouldn't have to be on the phone also for work stuff. Oh well this is my penis we are talking about so I just have to do what I have to do! I will just go in early and get as much work done as possible and go from there.

In other news I finally found out why my student loans (which I have been paying off by the way) were weighing down my credit report. Someone Messed up and my consolidation loan was pending and eventually got disregarded by default which causes my largest loan to appear defaulted though I have been paying it off! I found this out when I was trying to get financial aid for my MBA program. Luckily after playing much phone tag I found out how to get my financial aid stuff in order and rectify the situation with my old loans. This will help boost my credit score BIG TIME and allow me to start my program as long as all documents are in on time.

Things are moving which I am happy about! I just wish they would move a little faster!

Call me Mister Business!

I got into my MBA program that I applied for. I just have to figure out the Financial Aid and I will be taking things to the next level with my business. I tried to avoid the business stuff for so long but I am a business man through and through so I might as well take it to another level.

Life is moving forward

I will keep it as brief as possible by sectioning things off. Here we go!

Hysto

Day 7 post Hysto and I am doing GREAT! No pain just the mild discomfort still upon urination due to bladder spasms which are fading. No bleeding to date.

Lower surgery

I called my insurance regarding the letter the conversation was very good, better than I thought it would go. My documentation has to be reviewed and I may need to update some paperwork but things are looking good. No matter what I am happy I went forward with the submission of documents. I called surgeon's office to follow up regarding the conversation and things on their end. Things on their end is looking up.

Higher Education

I was going to put off my application process for the Master's Progam I wanted to do but decided to take the plunge. My application is already submitted and everything has been a go. I hope to hear soon. I have been wokring on this half assed for over a year but decided to confirm my desire to enroll in the program and hopefully I can get started soon. It seems like I am doing a lot but it is just enough.

Physical Fitness

I was going to get a family gym membership because my wife and I both need to work out more. We discussed it and decided to enhance our "home gym" (which so far consists of yoga mats, cardio rope, dumbells, curl bar, ab slide,, exercise ball, iron gym and perfect push up). The "enhancement" will lead to me getting some boxing gloves which I was interested in getting anyway. Once I can commit to doing it at home then I can revisit the formal gym issue. With the baby, the potential return to school and need for actual sleep I think this would be the best option. Plus I have my biological brother and enough friends with gym memberships that If I really need a formal gym day several have offered to have me go to their gym with them as a guest on the weekends and my days off.

Liver health

I have my appointment friday to see if those silly doctors will finally leave me alone OR if they would like to do more test to figure out why my liver looks crazy on imaging but lab wise I am still in awesome health. Nomral liver function, normal liver enzymes, All labs normal not one lab too low or too high. It has been like that for a long time. Specifically the past 5 months it has been checked it has been the same.

That's all for now! Life is moving forward

6 days post hysto returning to work and a surprise in the mail

Today makes 6 days since my hysto and I returned to work. I was feeling great and restless being in the house so I went back today. I thought it was going to be hard on me physically but I felt fine. The only issue was that I had to remind myself not to over do it. I actually took the elevator all most of the day. I usually only take the steps so that I can add to my cardio.

I made it to work, picked my daughter up from daycare and made it home without incident.

In other news I came home and there was a letter from my insurance. I opened it and is said.

Dear Mr. _______
We received a request dated February22nd, 2010 from ____ _____MD for (Insurance company's name) schedule of allowances for CPT (CODE was here) clitoroplasty, (CODE) urethroplasty and (CODE) vaginal hysterectomy for your tentative surgery scheduled on July 23rd, 2010. In order to determine the medical necessity of these services, we will need additional information from you. Please contact .... @..... or via email @...... We lookg forward to hearing from you!

I almost peed myself! This was dated the day I had my hysto and I already spoke to the surgeons assistant/ insurance person the day after my hysto and had the paperwork to her the day after that. This is just reassuring to see them willing to do the surgery. Though I know they would do it seeing it in writing makes it real!!

I don't know if I get to keep that July date but that was put in just to get the Auth. hopefully they let me keep it cause that means I would be healing right in time for my B-Day. I'm a LEO BABY!

We will see what happens in the coming weeks!


P.s. I started applying for programs I am going for another degree! I am one busy man.