Small Victory!

Noodles has been approved by our insurance company to go to New Jersey for St. Joseph's Feeding and Swallowing program!  We had been told initially that it was very rare to get a referral to go out-of-state for these sort of treatments.  So Josh and I started a letter campaign to everyone we could find in our insurance company who might listen.  I think we were persistent and reasonable in our expectations and that the insurance company ultimately listened to an argument that makes sense for them and for us!

I feel like we won the battle but we are still fighting the war- really on two fronts- getting LJ's insurance coverage to work properly and then getting the treatments to work, once we get help paying for them.  While we don't want to celebrate this victory too much, the real important part is getting Noodles to eat.  In a perfect world we could get him weaned off his feeding tube and have him eating french fries and string cheese afterwards. It certainly helps that most of it will be covered though.  And hey, a girl can dream!

Meanwhile, it seems like you shouldn't have to write a dozen letters to get something like this done.  Aside from being crazy busy with trying to persuade our insurance company that this was a medical necessity, we have been exploring the logistics of relocating to Paterson, NJ for five weeks.  I have put down a deposit on an apartment that is walking distance to the hospital.  I will pay week to week since we don't know how long the treatment will actually take.  Sight unseen, I'm quite overwhelmed and anxious about the whole situation. It will be so difficult to be away from Nate and Josh for so long. But at the same time, I think Josh and I have devised a pretty good game plan.  And on an even more positive note, I am thinking it will be sweet to get to the apartment at the end of the day and not have to cook dinner or clean the house.  Plus we will have some fun family side trips to NYC and Princeton on the weekends.