Good Newses

There are two of them, so I had to make News plural, of course. And both of them happened last Thursday.

Charlie's therapies (speech and OT) happen each week and the cost for each half-hour session is $90, of which our co-pay is $32.74.

It really adds up. Each month can cost us nearly $300 and he's been attending since January. When you add up all the other copays for dental, medical, prescriptions and counseling, we can easily spend half my monthly paycheck just keeping us all healthy and sane.

I was willing to do whatever it took to pay it, as the center is absolutely fantastic. His therapists keep up with advances and have an amazing way with children. It also happens to be a non-profit and we applied several months ago for some assistance and then promptly stopped paying our bills while we awaited a decision.

When we took him in last Thursday, I finally got there early enough to ask if they knew anything. Four people later, an irked-with-her-coworker administrative assistant came out to tell me that we were still missing a step.

Great. Having had Medicaid experiences with Melody, I was already prepared for another long haul.

Turns out the step was simple--I signed my name on a piece of paper. She started to walk away and I asked what percentage would be covered, thinking that a third or half of that would make my day.

100%.

***

Earlier that morning, I'd finally gotten organized enough to make a phone call. Since Dowlan left to work in another city, I'd been anxious about school transportation. Charlie is bussed to his school, but I was going to have to figure out how to be there to meet his buses, get the girls to their school (now 4 miles away instead of 2 blocks like their old one) and get to me at school by 7:20.

I could drop the girls off as early as 7, but the wild card was Charlie's bus schedule. If his pick up window was 6:40-7, this could perhaps work. If it was 7-7:20 it could not possibly work. If 7:20-7:40, I could take the girls, then have his bus get him from my campus. (Last year, they picked him up at our house and dropped him off, at the end of the day, by my classroom. They're a bit flexible with SpEd kids.)

If his bus were early or late, this would not work. The weeks I have 7 a.m. morning duty it would certainly not work.

Then there is the matter of afterschool care for the girls. No offense to anyone who works in one or whose children are in one, but I am not a fan of the ones I have seen. The environment is loud and chaotic, the children not well supervised.

But while having lunch with some coworkers on Monday, the counselor pointed out that the girls can be bussed, because they are at the magnet school.

I called The Bus Guy. He told me that the girls CAN be bussed, but that GT busing will not pick up at the home like SpEd busing. They will have to be picked up at their home campus and returned there.

I asked if it made a difference which campus--I mean, they are already picking a few kids up from the school I teach at, so it wouldn't add to their trip. He agreed that that would be fine.

So all I have to do now is get us all dressed and to my school in the morning (I say like it is so easy, right?) They can catch their buses outside my door, as my room is on the back edge of campus by where the buses go anyways. In the afternoons, they will be delivered to my door.

Whew.