Yes, Hook Me Up is still alive.....

It's been nearly 4 months....what happened?? Well, that's part of the problem. In some regards nothing happened. I like to sometimes refer to myself as living the life of a hobbit. I like to keep my life drama free and stable. But a hobbit must journey to progress forward. Now, when you watched little Frodo and Samwise making their way across middle earth, the movie only cut in either when something interesting was happening or a short footnote while on their walk. Have you looked at a map of Middle Earth? That was a long ass walk from one side of the continent to another. Most people won't even drive that distance, never mind walk it barefoot!

Well, this isn't a movie, so sometimes there are periods where there just isn't much to share. I suppose I could blog about the pink crud accumulating in the bathtub or my car hemorraging oil and coolant..but this is about a CI journey. The insurance issue has been dead and unmoving since my last post. I otherwise felt quite unmotivated with things in limbo. I even stopped bothering to read or participate in any of my CI-related List Groups. What was the point??

It was about a month ago when the mundane snapped. I called Cigna to find out what they had on review from Rochelle at Advanced Bionics. They basically told me nothing had progressed whatsoever from the last contact I reported. Meaning all of these months and NOTHING had budged or been put in to help keep things rolling. I had been emailing Rochelle at Advanced Bionics for a status report on what she was submitting to Cigna and what I could do to help. No reply to any of them. This was during the hiatus over the last several months. After talking with Cigna...I got on the phone via Relay through instant messenger and chased her down at the office. I told her what I had been told and she said "I'll send out another form letter and follow up with you in a few days." She never got back to me.

I happened to be browsing one of my List Groups and someone mentioned an organization named Let Them Hear as having put their appeal through for them. I did an overview of the website and contacted my mentor, Lorie. She got in touch with her contacts at AB and got back to me ..letting me know they are the real deal and have a 100% Success rate...commenting on the background of some of the key players at the organization very postively. In short..she said "go for it!"...allowing me to dismiss any worry I had about conflict with Rochelle's handling of the appeal....or lack of it.

So now my appeal has been taken away from Rochelle...I do not have an explanation for why she was so unhelpful. Perhaps she had an overwhelming case-load...but that still didn't excuse the lack of communicating with me. It's now being handled by Let Them Hear. My communications with the woman in charge have been quite encouraging. She is a mother of an implanted child who had to go through the ordeal with insurance herself....so as a result she is quite impassioned. Where Rochelle was submitting form letters that didn't address specific issues to expedite the process...resulting in no progress.....Let Them Hear was asking all kinds of questions and suggesting various methods of slamming this thing through. They are quite backed up with appeals..but the point is...these people care! I still expect it will take some months, but I'm fine with that as long as I know something is being done.

So continues the journey, with one of the actors in the fellowship fired for sitting on their ass and another in their place...sword drawn and ready for battle against the forces of Sauron on one front so I can continue my journey on my front.

I'll soon be turning (turning turning)
Round the corner now
Outside the dawn is breaking
But inside in the dark I'm aching to be free
The show must go on
The Show Must Go On - Queen