Scared the Crap Out of Me

Thurs night at about 1:15am, I am woken up by a knocking noise. Sounded like someone either knocking on the wall in the hallway of my apartment building or someone maybe falling down the stairs which run along my bathroom wall. Then someone bangs on my door a couple times but when I look out the peephole no one is there. I started to freak out. It wasnt normal knock on someone's door kind of noise either. So I went out to the living room so I can peer thru my blinds and before I can even get to the blinds I notice someone is shining a light into my window. I really started to freak out so I called 911 for the first time in my life. The operator was really nice and took my information and then went to see about dispatching someone.

Meanwhile the banging keeps happening every few mins or so I keep looking out the peephole and no one is there. The operator comes back and says that its the police outside my door. She said she would stay on the line with me as I opened the door and sure enough 2 officers are outside my door and I tell them 'Y'all scared the crap out of me!' They said that they received a call for my address (and apt #) and I told them that it wasnt me, I was dead asleep until I heard the pounding at the door. So they took my name and number and turns out the number they said that called them was a totally different number than mine.

Needless to say I had a hard time getting back to sleep and didnt sleep well at all.

Bariatric Support Group

So tonight I decided to go to my first Bariatric Support Group Meeting at Plano Presby (actually the name changed, its like Texas Health Plano Presbyterian Hospital now). It was good to go and get an idea of what I am in for with my upcoming Lap Band surgery. The group was pretty split between those that have had the Lap Band vs the 'sleeve' (the sleeve is where they actually cut out part of your stomach to make it smaller) vs re-routing (aka Gastric By-pass). Most of the people had their surgeries in Dec or Jan. There was one person that had it in July and a couple people that had it in Sept of last year.

Well they didnt scare me off with their stories yet and I did pick up a few tips for when I have my surgery. Only 2 more weeks!

Updates...

Several weeks ago I blogged about my unhealthy self and my decision to have Lap Band surgery. Originally when I decided to pursue the surgery back in Dec, I found out that my insurance would not pay for the surgery and I was really upset about it. However I was determined to do what I needed to do to turn my health around and was exploring options to pay for the surgery myself. I applied for financing but was declined due to some information on my credit bureau that I didnt know about. So I needed to get that cleaned up.

You may remember my extreme dislike of Time Warner Cable...well it has deepened even more. Apparently I still owed them $200 from almost 2 years ago when I lived in San Antonio and had switched cable companies. Unfortunately they never bothered to tell me I still owed this money and turned it over to collection agency who also never contacted me either. To top it off, when I was forced to use them again here in Plano they still neglected to collect this money. Now dont you think it would be in your best interest as a company that when you have someone over a barrel so to speak that you take advantage of that and get the money that someone owes you first before giving them service again! What a stupid way to run a business and even furthers my opinion of why I dislike them so much.

In addition there were 2 other companies that reported 1 late payment each which occurred when I had issues with the post office in San Antonio. I basically was not getting mail at all or when I did it was very late. I filed a complaint with the post office not that it really accomplishes anything and also contacted the companies that I received the bills late for to let them know what was happening. It sucks though because it still has an impact on my credit even though it wasnt my fault. I can understand the companies point of view since it isnt their fault either but it sucks because the post office is the one who is reponsible for the problem but it doesnt impact them at all. Just doesnt seem right.

Anyway I still decided to go ahead and use some of my savings to pay for the surgery and I would treat it as a loan from myself and pay it back over time. I scheduled the surgery for Fri 2/20.

I found out a couple weeks ago that when my Dr called the insurance company to get the letter of denial for the surgery, they said that there was not an exclusion in my policy and that they would be able to approve the surgery as long as we could provide my weight history for the last 5 years and as long as it reflected that I have been overweight for those 5 yrs. Apparently there was a change in my policy on Jan 1st. YAY! So all I had to do was track down information down. A little easier said than done. But I am happy to say I was able to track it down. I almost had to hop on a plane to retrieve my old MD files from a Dr that they were sent to in San Antonio since they would only release the info to me, in person. But with the help of the surgery coordinator at my Dr's office she was able to persuade them to release my weight info for 2004 which is what we needed.

The only drawback to this has been that I had to push back my surgery 2 weeks and it is now scheduled for Fri 3/6. I am very excited and am still a little cautious that the insurance company may change their mind again but at least I have a back up plan if needed.

Sorry for the long post but a lot has happened since my last post. :)