What Summer/Life is About

 It is...

A cat nap after work on a hot Friday afternoon.

Frizzy hair and no make-up on a Saturday morning.

Outdoor picnics at a historic Virginia plantation.

Blowing a tire on a gravelly road in the country, spending a Sunday afternoon searching for at least one repair shop that could fix it.

Waiting three hours at bankrupt shopping mall for new tires, eating food court pizza to push back the hunger pangs.

Arriving at family dinner with all the ingredients two hours late.  But a low-country shrimp boil tastes good anytime. 

Being exhausted, sweaty, having frizzy hair, running late. 

A trip to the bank, a boring work event, a birthday party, early Sunday morning church, a blown tire, riding with the windows down, good seafood, good people.

 

"A life without love

 is like a year without summer."

Swedish Proverb

Faith Through Hearing: The D.V. Philosophy

"Now listen to me, you that say, 'Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go into business and make a lot of money.'  You don't even know what your life tomorrow will be!  You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment and then disappears.  What you should say is this:  'If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.'"

James 4:13-15 (GNT)

When I was a teenager, as a way to cope with my diagnosis with kidney disease and bring some stability to my world, I became a chronic planner.  To this day, I get made fun of by my sisters because of all the pieces of computer paper, journal paper, and sticky notes with scratched out To-Do lists I'd leave around.  They'd be complete with timelines to the second and an estimated amount of time that it would take me to complete an action.  I was obsessed, I was sick, and I didn't know how else to cope.  Actual hours would pass in a day where I'd sit in my room, journal, write to-do lists, and cry.  

I eventually grew out of it. I'm still very much a natural planner.  I wouldn't be defined as "spontaneous" by an meaning of the word.  Have I relaxed over the years? Yes.  I'll usually plan things up until a certain point, and then (in the words of one of Ben's and my favorite songs) let Jesus take the wheel.  And sometimes that wheel leads us to having a really awesome unexpected experience.  

Life is very different for me now.  Not that Ben and I never planned anything before, but now that we're married we have so much fun just talking about the future.  And we talk about these things as if being married means they are automatically going to happen.  It's almost as if when we were engaged or just dating, we weren't sure if these things were really going to happen, because there was always the possibility of an unexpected break-up.  But now that we're married, we've started to think more about things we plan actually coming to pass.  

When I discuss "plans" with other people, I'm always incredibly excited.  Dreaming and imagining is one of my favorite pastimes, as is planning stuff.  But then it's only a matter of time before I start to have a panic attack, and anxiety and frustration creeps into my psyche.  When you've gone through any experience with chronic illness, you know that even the best laid plans can fail.  You've lived through it.  You've seen dreams that you hoped, believed, and just knew would happen, shatter right before your eyes on the rough, gravelly concrete known as reality. You think about what it felt like to have that happen, how broken-hearted you were.  You wonder, what's the point.  When you have a disease with no cure, you feel like you're constantly in a state of limbo, waiting for the other shoe to drop...or organ to fail. Why even plan or dream of anything in the future?  We can't predict what path our lives take. Only God knows.  And God knows me so well. 

This week of marriage, just as Ben and I passed the one month mark, was spent discussing our money, and what we want to do with it going forward.  Like most young married couples, there's talk of houses and traveling and emergency funds.  Unlike many married couples our age, there's talk of medical bills and health insurance and what if IT happens again.  As excited as I was to have a joint budget and the same ideas on how we manage it, I was also nervous and frustrated with how we'd deal with another major surgery like this.  I'd been studying this devotional on my Bible app called "Battlefield of the Mind" written by Joyce Meyer.  On one of the days she wrote about a man who was big on saying D.V. after talking about everything he hoped to do for the next day, week, month, year, or even life.  D.V. is an abbreviation for "Deo volente," which in Latin means "God willing."  The man described his D.V. theory as "having great ideas" about things he wanted to do or see, but D.V. was a reminder to him that he just wanted his ideas to in line with what God had planned for his life.  

I so want to subscribe to this D.V. mindset.  Because it's been a struggle for me to be able to dream freely or even plan what I'm going to eat for dinner without thinking, "Well, that could happen, if my kidney doesn't fail."  What I know for sure is that God says He knows the plans that He has for my life, "plans to bring you prosperity and not disaster, plans to bring about the future you hope for."  So there is no need to feel like any idea I dream up will end in calamity.  And what I hope to remember, as I dream and plan with Ben and as we talk about our lives together:  even if something we really want falls through, we can still rejoice.  Nothing that we want for ourselves is ever better than what God wants for us.  And sometimes, what we want and what God want are the same thing.  

I really wanted my sister to donate her kidney to me. We had both planned on it.  We both wanted it to happen in February!  As you know, it didn't happen that way.  But you know what:  what God had planned for me and my dad, and the way it happened, and the timing of it all, I wouldn't go back and change one single thing.

 

"My heavenly Father, please help me live today.  Whether I actually say the words D.V. or not, remind me that Your will is more important than anything in my life.  Help me not to allow Satan to get me thinking so much about tomorrow that I fail to live today in a way that pleases You.  I ask this in Jesus' name.  Amen."

No Money, Mo Problems

Two and a half months with the Kidney

"See Imma tell you

Like Wu told me

Cash rules everything around me

Singin dolla dolla bill, y'all

Singin dolla dolla bill, y'all"

 The one and only Wyclef Jean

  

I've been meaning to write a post about the cost of kidney transplants for a while.  But right now, the timing is perfect because last week I received my bill for my hospital stay, anesthesia, actual surgery, my dad's portion of the surgery, and my medications that I took during the hospital stay.  And I had been waiting for this bill, watching the mail box like a dog sitting by the storm door of a house watching cars pull out of drive ways and the wayward basketballs of bad kids bounce into our yard.  But then, at one time I thought, "Maybe it's not going to come.  Maybe they're not going to charge me for the surgery. After all, I've already paid so much money to doctors over the past year."  

Lesson #1:  It takes a while for medical bills to actually get passed on to the patient.  In this case, it took roughly two months after the surgery for the hospital to send me my bill.  During that two months, the hospital financial division drew up the numbers and exact costs of everything and negotiated with my insurance company.  My insurance company told them what it was going to pay for the surgery.  And then what was left over was sent to me.  

I had an idea of what I would have to pay, and I also had an idea of the worst case scenario.  

Lesson #2:  Become really well versed in what your health insurance policy dictates.  The health insurance we have through my job requires, among other things, a 10 percent coinsurance on any medical procedures like outpatient and inpatient surgery.  At the first meeting on Kidney transplants that Ben and I ever attended, we were told how much we should anticipate paying.  MATH TIME!  And yes, I'm using a calculator.  I'm a writer, not a math-er.

The entire transplant was estimated to cost $140,000.  Yep.  Staying alive is expensive!  And the sad part is, if you don't have insurance, this is pretty close to what you would have to pay.  Luckily, most hospitals have some kind of financing program and help for those who can't make the payments.

Per my insurance's coinsurance policy, 10 percent of $140,000 is $14,000.  Wow!  A new car, or a really well planned, small wedding.  

That's what added a whole other complicated layer to this whole transplant thing.  Ben and I were planning our wedding, reading up on the average costs of weddings in the D.C. area.  How much is the average wedding in the D.C. area?  $32,500.  And that total right there is for if you invite 100 people to your wedding. Ben and I invited 235 and ended up paying for 180.

"All I see is signs. All I see is dollar signs. Money on my mind. Money, money on my mind."

The good thing is that it's really hard to be concerned about bank accounts and piles and piles of money flying out the window, when your major organs are on the brink of imploding inside your body.  Now, don't get me wrong.  There were plenty of times when I turned to Ben and said "Maybe we should just not have the transplant, save the money, and travel around the world together."  Don't judge me. I was sick.  There was toxic waste floating around in my blood and it was clouding my judgment. 

So my insurance plan has the coinsurance policy, but, like most other plans, it also has an out-of-pocket maximum.  Your OOP max would be what a plan participant pays within a year of the plan.  For example, if your OOP max is $1000 each year, then once you pay $1000 in procedures, hospital visits, etc., you won't have to pay anymore.  Now most people, don't reach their OOP max, because most young people like me are healthy as a prize winning horse.  So if you go to the doctor only once a year, you're not going to hit your OOP max.  

But lucky for sick people like me, once I hit my max (which has either already happened or is happening in the next week due to my ER visit) I can have all the free surgeries I want!  So YAY for me!  I might just get all my organs replaced.  Like a full body tune up.  

Lesson #3:  If you don't have an emergency fund, start one right now.  So you want to hear something dumb and immature and idiotic and stupid?  Ben and I started our emergency fund in January.  I know....we're STUPID.  Now, that's not to say that we didn't have savings. Before I moved in with Ben two years ago, I had built up a considerable amount of savings because I lived with my parents.  They say you should have three to six months salary (or rent or living expenses depending on your school of thought) saved up in a bank account for emergencies.  Well I definitely had that.  Like I said, I lived with my parents.  But I wasn't necessarily saving all of that up for "emergencies."  I was saving it so that I could move out of my parents' house and afford security deposits, first month's rent, and maybe even some new furniture.  Then once that was taken care of, Ben and I got engaged, and I decided to use most of it to pay for our wedding.  So when all this stuff went down, and there was a strong possibility that I was going to have to go on unpaid leave for some time after my kidney transplant, Ben and I immediately started saving to cover my half of the rent and my living expenses if I had to take unpaid leave.

LUCKILY, I didn't have to take that much leave, and was paid for all of the time that I took off work.  But what if that hadn't been the case?  It's the "what ifs" that always get you.  What if...the car breaks down?  What if...I don't have enough paid leave?  What if...YOU HAVE TO HAVE A KIDNEY TRANSPLANT???  And that's where emergency funds come in.  

Lessons Learned:  Having a major surgery really rocks your mental state, emotional state, and financial state.  There are so many doctor's reports, lab results, and procedures to schedule, and then bills to pay.  And your family and friends never want you to have to think about the money because "This is your life," they always say.  You're life is more important than some money.  Please. In all honesty, when it's happening to you, and your spouse, the thought process doesn't always go like that.  Because after the surgery,  it's you who is responsible for the remaining balance.  It's you who has to figure out how to make ends meet.  It's you who has to count the zeros.  Yes, you know your life is more important than dollar signs.  But what about the rent and all those wedding vendors you promised to pay off?  

Throughout this process I've come to have a new appreciation for really good health insurance plans.  Because those plans make the difference between paying $14,000 for a kidney transplant or just paying $14.  

Ben and I have become super serious about establishing a household budget that we can live with.  Budgets can be hard because you can't have everything you want. But we think we've come of with one that still allows us to save for the future, pay down medical bills, and still invest money in the things that we love doing.  And now that the wedding is over and paid off, we are more committed than ever to building up our emergency fund.  

Lastly, more than ever I just do not understand those people who are against Obamacare.  Ben says only the opponents call it that.  I'm a supporter and I call it that just because I feel like it rolls of the tongue a little easier than "Affordable Care Act."  Something just tells me that most of those people against it are super healthy people who have never had any problems ever in their life, or just a-holes who think it's OK for sick people to not have access to insurance.

I'm gonna go with option C:  that they are just a-holes all around.

Living for the Weekend: Birthdays, Sick Days, Name Change

Whew, what a weekend.

• Top Left:  I made Ben's birthday cake, from scratch.  It's the classic yellow with Chocolate Frosting.  And so far, this is the best yellow cake from scratch that I've ever made.  For five years now I've been making yellow cakes that were really dry, or just missing the mark.  This recipe that I found on Bakerella really brought me closer to my dream of the perfect, Box quality, yellow cake from scratch.
• Bottom Left:  My kitty! Burton!  When you have a cat you're just obligated to take multiple random pictures of that cat.  
• Top Right:  One of the best things I've discovered, is making homemade sausage.  It's soooo easy and cost effective. I cooked up some chicken sausage that I made back in May but froze in my freezer.
• Middle Right:  A beautiful sunset from my friend's roof top at the outdoor happy hour she hosted.  I didn't drink anything but it was probably for the best because....
• I went to the hospital the next day (bottom right).  Oops.  I'm OK now, but Sunday kind of sucked.  And I felt like crap for the entire day, and half of today.  Gotta love the IV picture.  I've got a bunch of them.  Just like with cats---if you have multiple IVs put in, you're kind of obligated to take pictures of every single one.  

P.S.  I've been married for a month!  And in case you haven't noticed,  I officially changed my last name.  As a child, I always thought/knew that I would just take my husband's last name.  But then once I started my career path, I realized that I really like my maiden last name.  Actually, I love it.  It really just goes so well with the rest of my name, first and middle.  And you want to know something funny?  I was always secretly jealous of hyphenates.  Like, how come they got two last names and I only had one?!  I was even jealous of the hyphenated first names, like John-Paul or Jessie-Lynn.  Well, guess what?  Dreams do come true.  I am finally....a hyphenate. 

It's Ben's Birthday!

It's my hub-hubs birthday!!!  Did you like that? Hub-hub.  Yeah.  I went there.  

It's Ben's birthday y'all.  Another July 12 has come and I'm so thankful that he's made it to see another year.  

The Ashmans!

Also, how lucky is Ben that from now on he gets to celebrate his birthday one month after our wedding anniversary?  Also, ALSO, in a few years he'll be the most spoiled husband of them all.  Father's Day, our wedding anniversary, and his birthday, all within weeks of each other.  This must be payback for having to give me double presents since I'm a Valentine's Day baby.  

I already had one challenge to complete:  make Ben another from-scratch yellow cake with chocolate frosting.  The verdict will be handed down this evening after dinner (please be moist Duncan Hines/Betty Crocker quality or something close to it!). The second challenge I gave myself...make another list.  Yes. I just love them and I can't live without them.  So here goes. My favorite "Ben memories" from the past year: 

1.  Ben's last birthday party.  Ben is the youngest child in his family. I'm the oldest in mine, which means there's always going to be a part of me that wants to baby him.  So when he whined to me about not having a birthday party in a while, I said to myself "This poor, helpless baby needs a birthday party.  Not just any party. A super-hero party."  And that's exactly what I did.  I had lots of help from my siblings and siblings-in-law.  And we also had a moon bounce.  All babies like moon bounces.

2.  Ben's diet when I went to Kazakhstan for a week.  He was on what most people call the pizza diet. 

3.  Ben's weird last minute zombie Halloween costume.  It was one of those situations where you go to the Halloween store and most of the stuff is picked over, so all that's left are weird, last minute, zombie outfits.  

4.  Ben picking out and designing our save-the-dates.  I really had no idea that Ben was so into paper products.  He did an excellent job though.  

5.  Ben getting really into picking out our wedding stationary.  I think he's found his calling.  

6.  Ben passing the only McDonald's on the way to our four-hour kidney transplant consultation.  OK so, passing the McDonald's wasn't my favorite thing.  But it's one of those situations where you can't help but laugh after the fact.  Never trust Ben when he says we can sleep in a little.  Lesson learned.

7.  Ben getting his blood drawn.  He really wanted to donate his kidney to me.  We aren't a match but I'm so grateful he tried.  He hates needles.

8.  Ben getting me some Beats!  I may never fully be able to enjoy them though because Ben calls me spoiled every chance he gets.

9.  Ben making chicken and waffles for Christmas breakfast...sort of.  My mom was being a helicopter kitchen mom.  So I'm not even sure if Ben got to fry any pieces of chicken by himself.

10. Ben joining a group at church.  I was so happy about this because I already joined a couple of small groups and just really wanted Ben to experience my happiness. He joined softball.

11. Ben writing an excellent and inspiring post about sitting in the waiting room during my kidney transplant.

12.  Ben giving the best speech at my sister Danyelle's graduation dinner.  He just has such a way with words.  Writing, speaking, I just love it. 

13.  Ben visiting me every day while I was recovering from surgery at my parents' house.

14.  Ben saying his marriage vows...to me of course.  Such a great feeling!  He just seemed so sure of everything, which is always nice to have in a spouse.

15.  Ben getting really engrossed in antiquing in Charlottesville during our micro-moon.  Maybe that Nazi can opener will be there when we go next time.

16.  Ben helping me clean my exit site when I had my PD catheter placement.  

17.  Ben's daily "cat-squish" sessions.  This is why the cat is plotting to scratch our eyes out one night.  Because of these squish sessions.

18.  Ben's excitement about receiving a rice cooker as a wedding gift.  

19.  Ben starting a fire on our first camping trip.  It was really windy and the wood was kinda wet.  It also started to get kinda cold. So, thank you.

20.  Ben making the very convincing argument that we should eat a dozen Krispy Kreme donuts in one sitting.  

And guess what--Ben's birthday is actually the day before Krispy Kreme gives out a dozen donuts for a dollar in honor of its own birthday.  

Ben this is the eighth year that we've celebrated your birthday.  The first year that we've celebrated it while married.  May God bless you with many, many, many, many, many more years.  I meant what I said a while ago:  I really just can't wait to see what you look like when you're old.  Like old, old.