He always shows up...

It's been almost two years since I've put my hands on this blog. I wish I could go through all the emotions I have felt since then but this would take you the rest of the week to read. 2016 was great. It aligned with the life my family and I had been living since, well....ever. My kids have always had the life they've always wanted, we hadn't really experienced a lot of heartache and Matt and I had what we felt was an amazing marriage. 2017 actually started off really great. We had been planning a trip to Disney with Matt's sisters family and his parents for over two years. We went in April and I'm telling you, we have been on some great vacations but this one was extra special. The bond all of us shared was super awesome. There's one special part of the trip I want to go over. I got into a small argument, OK small may be pushing it. It was a yelling match with a bunch of rude teenagers when they tried to cut us in line for a ride when it was ten thousand degrees out. My makeup was sweating off my face and every ride we tried to go on that day was broke so I was agitated.  You know when you do something that you think is right even though it's wrong? It was like that. I was trying to teach the small kids we are parenting as well as a couple of our niece and nephews that were in line with us to always stand up for themselves even if it's not easy. Wellllllll......probably wasn't the best choice. When I was done chewing the rotten teens out and basically telling them they were the scum of the earth I turned around to Jersi and my niece asking a million questions about how awful I thought these people were,  my sister in law Jaci snickering like she wants to burst out laughing but was probably afraid of how that would look to the 100 other people in line, my husband saying "you think you can just do that stuff but when they come over to punch your face in i'm going to be the one that has to deal with it!" My brother in law Darin, looking around like he's in the wrong family and is NEVER going to claim he knows me. Then I see my father in law, Kenny. He is looking right at me, saying nothing. Just smiling and shaking his head side to side.  As most of you know, we lost Kenny shortly after that trip. When I was writing my speech for his celebration of life I kept coming back to that day and how he looked at me. Most of you might be thinking that he probably wanted me kicked out of the family but you're wrong. What he was showing me was that no matter how stupid and awful I looked/sounded, he still loved me for exactly who I was. There was no shame in him knowing me in that moment or ever. (Thanks a lot Darin, Jaci and Matt!)  He accepted me for my flaws and all. SO...to finish my first paragraph in two years, my goal for 2018 is to be like my father in law. ALWAYS see the good, even when everything seems so bad. The rest of the year had a lot of bad in it with a few glimpses of good. But mostly bad. 

So, 2018 comes and since the number of the year changed then life just gets better, right? I kept saying: "2018 will be a better year, it has to be." Well let me tell you something. Just because the last number is an 8 instead of a 7 doesn't mean $#@%! January sucked. Like really sucked. I left my job last fall to come back home to be with my girls and put 100% of my efforts into being a better wife and mom. It's where my heart is right now even though I had the best job on the planet. Matt and I have both put ten thousand percent effort into revamping our marriage and it's paid off. Those are great things but there's bad that comes with the good.
 Since I left my job, we went back on Matt's health insurance. It's always a process switching Kadi's prescriptions over any time there is a change but this time was more difficult. Her endocrinologist told me to be prepared. Insurance companies were repeatedly denying any sort of specialty medications because of the high cost. Her exact words were "They are just hoping people will give up after they deny it." Well let me tell you, the words "give up" are not in the Breuer vocabulary. But, they denied us. I believe God places events in our lives as the need to be. Challenges and all. I have spent hours and hours on the phone with our insurance, her endocrinologist, the pharmacy, and anything anyone has given me a lead on. I wouldn't have been able to do it if I was at work 8 hours a day...Also, thank you to all of our Facebook friends that reached out with ways to help. We tried everything everyone sent us which all ended up as dead ends. My aunt told me I had the right to speak with a HIPPA Compliance Officer to see who denied our claim and whether or not their credentials were sufficient. When I found out it was a pharmacist who denied it, I told them I would be calling the Attorney General if they didn't turn it around. Oh but there's a loop-hole. The pharmacist (someone who has NO idea if Kadi medically needs those injections or not) is allowed to deny it because they are just in charge of clicking the buttons of the Pre-Auth survey made up by a team of Doctors. Of course.... Countless people told us about coupons for free meds directly though the makers of the medication. Those are all great, except when you're trying to get a $5,000 medication, they will only follow suit of insurance if you make more than a certain amount of money.

We were denied twice in January. Once for Kadi's Norditropin, that she has been on since she started therapy and once for Omnitrope- hormones equivalent to Norditropin that is the insurance companies "preferred medication." It's weird because the Omnitrope is about $2,000.00 more than the Norditropin. We submitted the appeal on January 12 and were told it would take 30 days. I keep receiving postcards and phone calls that say "Thank you so much for your appeal, but this is to inform you it hasn't been worked on yet." Seriously.... 
Meanwhile, Kadi was starting to regress to her pre-therapy self. She has a hard time understanding questions and comments, she will only eat one meal a day and started losing weight. A couple weeks ago she said: "Mom, I don't want to die at 4'10" 

We went to church on Saturday night. Ever since Matt's dad died we have been digging into Hope Church because of how much they showed up for our family. We just started attending services there in December.  It's a new adventure for our whole family, including our kids. We are lucky enough to get to go with Matt's Mom, his sisters family and my brothers family. It's a great thing to share with them...now to get my Catholic parents to come! :) Anyhoo- we were at church and they ended the service with asking us to write something down on a piece of paper and hand it over to God. Something that we had been worrying about that we wanted him to take from us.  I wrote down that God would take the stress off of me for not being able to give Kadi what she needs. Through all the fighting and phone calls and prayers and pleads and begging for someone to see what they were doing to a little girl who just wants to be a normal kid, I asked him to just take it all away. I am human and even though sometimes my kids think I have super natural powers or eyes in the back of my head, i'm just a mom that doesn't know how to give up. What I have learned was that giving up wasn't what I had to do at all. I just needed to give in. Give in to Him and his almighty power to make everything right. I believe He gives us these hurdles to bring us closer to Him. I told myself I was going to give it up but I'm not sure I had confidence in myself to actually do it. I prayed for myself- something I rarely do unless it's to stop me from having a meltdown or reaching through the phone to choke the person on the other line telling me they know my daughters needs more than I do. People- it worked. This morning I was getting ready ready to make my 214th call to the Dr. and the insurance. The insurance company hates me so much as soon as they get on the line and I give them our ID number- they transfer me to the "complaint and resolution department." Because of that, I decided to get online to check the status (that is never updated) first. I opened up our portal and I see the words "Resolution of your appeal." I didn't think anything of it because it was dated the 22nd and I hadn't heard from them. I also received a call on Friday from our Dr.'s office that said they still hadn't heard anything on the appeal. That was wrong information because this letter says that as of 1/22/2018 her medication is approved and ready to be sent out! Y'all....I gave my note to God and he showed up. It wasn't until I asked for him to take it from me that he showed up. My human self wanted to fix it myself and win and tell everyone to shove it! My heart tells me that when we surrender, we are rewarded greatly. That's what I did on Saturday night. 
I'm looking back at the last few weeks. I spoke with a few people on the phone that I literally lost it on. One lady was not super nice to me until I broke down and started crying so hard I could barely talk to her. When she heard how broken I was, she actually had compassion for us. She said "Ma'am I can't make the decision but I'm going to talk with your case manager about how much your daughter needs this medication." I can imagine she deals with people all day who are simply on their last strand of sanity and are probably not the nicest. Hopefully she was reminded that day that frustration can come from loving someone so much you can't take no for an answer.  I told another guy that he wasn't hanging up the phone with me until he helped me. He couldn't help me get it approved but he could listen to my story and put notes into our account that could have made someone see Kadi as something besides a number. 

What's next? We will hopefully have her shots at our doorstep by the end of the week and she can be back on track. Her endocrinologist thinks she might be done growing by this summer. The thing I worry about is what they do for her brain. Even though her body will be done growing, her brain won't and i'm not sure what that will do for her. For learning, for eating, for communicating etc...We will cross that bridge when we get there though. For now, we soak up His Grace.

Ultimately, grace can never be earned. Like all gifts it can only be received, requiring that I simply open my hands and trust.
- Mark Yaconelli