A Pain in My Neck March 10, 2008

Literally.

My neck is killing me. It’s affecting my ability to take care of my kids! I injured it on Lance’s birthday while transferring Miles carseat from our minivan into our new Prius, the vehicle of choice for any trip over 5 miles away. Somehow, while fighting and wrangling with said carseat, I pulled a neck muscle. Owwww….I didn’t realize it right away. Now it is so painful I can barely do anything.

Where is that mom’s workman’s comp when you need it? Lucky for me Steve is incredibly busy at work, writing the proposal for his book and studying for some certification that he needs to have done by month’s end. Steve is MIA from family life. Which means that every day I vow to take it easy, sit on the couch and watch endless hours of Scooby Doo while while my neck heals. And every day that lasts about an hour until the reality of motherhood is once again apparent. And that reality sounds something like this: Moms Don’t Get Sick Days. Great. I’m screwed.

Blake keeps making fun of me, saying that I look like a robot. Wow, that’s helpful. Can you please get mommy dearest some more motrin? The pain is so intense, maybe it’s a pinched nerve? Or my personal favorite, a tumor? I think it’s just a pulled muscle this time, but it hurts and I’m sick of hurting for almost a week now and life sucks.

Update on the A/C March 5, 2008

I’m taking a temporary reprieve from  vacuuming up insulation to blog you my update.

We had our meeting yesterday. While it was heated at times (lol!!! pun intended!) and we were demanding a full system replacement, we caved after listening to their reasoning. They found mulitple (!!!) leaks in the attic and agreed upon replacing the entire unit in the attic (the coil something or other). They came out this am and spent 4 hours replacing said thingy in the attic and leak testing the copper piping throughout the house and the condenser outside. They indeed found a leak in the copper piping, which they repaired by ripping out part of the wall in Blake’s closet. They say that the condenser is fine but they are running a 24 hour test with a vacuum that will see if the condenser and rest of the copper piping are leak free. They will be back tomorrow to check everything out, fill up the freon and we are good to go, supposedly. They only reason we are trying this last chance fix is because if the system breaks after this and STILL doesn’t work properly our builder will pay for a new system to be put in by the company of our choice. Hopefully this will be the last time we ever have to deal with this issue. I’m not naieve about the fact that air conditioners don’t last forever and we will probably need freon fill ups from time to time (every couple of years or so) but I don’t want to deal with Capital Air anymore.

Can you believe that when they were here yesterday testing and monitoring that they shut off the furnace and didn’t turn it back on. We had no idea what the deal was so we were without heat last night. It didn’t get terribly cold but our house was down to 66 degrees when we woke up and it’s just plain irritating!!!

Hopefully after tomorrow (and again on Mon when the drywall is repaired) things will be all fixed. Oh, the builder extended our warranty another year and our system’s freon levels will be checked periodically to make sure that everything is working and we’re not stuck in the middle of summer without air.

Unbelievable! February 26, 2008

We built our house when we first moved to TX. We fell in love with the backyard of this house. It was already half built and it had all the things we were looking for…island kitchen, open floor plan, 4 bedrooms, an office and a gorgeous, wooded, private backyard. 2 years later we still love our house (although we wish it were a bit bigger, miss that basement!) and we still love our area. There is one small source of contention.

AIR CONDITIONING!!!!!!

I’m beyond livid. I’m beyond frustrated. I’m about to contact a lawyer.

We have had nothing but problems with the A/C unit and the company who has installed it. They have been out more times than I can count to “fix” the problem. This includes finding a leak, replacing evaporated freon and insisting that this will be the last service call. A couple of months later, like clockwork, the house starts to feel warmer and warmer and we realize that the air hasn’t been working properly AGAIN! I don’t even want to know how much money we’ve wasted in electric bills. It literally makes me sick. Good thing all of this has been under warranty thus far so it hasn’t cost us much. We stupidly paid for a couple of service calls and freon fill ups but that has been the extent of it. Well, financially, anyway, not physical turmoil which brings me yet again to Mr. Miles.

 Miles cannot tolerate heat at all. Miles has a rare condition where he has an allergic reaction to his own sweat. Any time he sweats he gets wicked hives (they look more like welts) and if left untreated can be very severe landing him in the hospital. Not to mention that the heat also flares his eczema and that effects his comfort and sleep. It’s a quality of life thing. And because of Capital Air, my child has suffered on numerous occasions. Another issue is that when your air doesn’t work well, your house heats up very easily. This poses a major problem for us. We have to cook the majority of our food at home. We don’t have the luxury of convenience foods or take out because of Miles’ multiple food allergies. So the other day (and it’s FEBRUARY, mind you) when I made dinner in the oven it heated up the whole house! And it wasn’t even very hot outside!!!

I’m about to call Capital Air and demand an entire new system be put in our house, free of charge. My family has been through too much and no child should have to live like this in a brand new house with a brand new air conditioner. If they don’t come out and fix their problems as soon as they can, I’m contacting the media AND a lawyer. We’ve taken all the right steps to get this fixed and Capital Air only wants to bandage their problem. And I’m not standing for it anymore. Miles has enough that he has to deal with in his young life. There are so many things that he and we can’t do because of this heat intolerance. He shouldn’t have to suffer in his own house too!

 I’ll keep you posted. Wish us luck!

The crazy thing that Miles has January 10, 2008

Here is a blurb about a newscast tonight about a girl that has the same thing that Miles has. Isn’t it terrible what the insurance company is doing to this family? The girl is obviously more severe than Miles but the thing about this disease/condition is that it can turn severe at any given time. Lmk if you catch the newscast, I plan on DVRing it.

Have you ever battled an insurance company that won’t cover your most
basic needs?

Watch “World News with Charles Gibson” Thursday at 6:30 p.m. ET to
hear one family’s horrific story Three-year-old Hannah Devane suffers
from a severe and rare food allergy that causes her white blood cells
to attack her esophagus, which makes it impossible for her to eat
food. There’s no cure for her condition, which is called eosinophilic
esophagitis, or EE, and affects one out of 10,000 children. Little
Hannah has suffered from this condition since she was 11 months old,
and she’s survived by getting most of her nutrition from a doctor-
prescribed formula called Elecare. The only other foods she can eat
are rice and pears.

But the Devane family faces a dilemma. Its insurance company has
stopped paying for the formula because it is technically a food
supplement, which is not covered by their insurance.

Without the formula, Hannah will become undernourished. But to pay
for the formula, the Devanes — who currently live on Hannah’s
father’s salary as a police officer — will have to pay $1,200 per
month just to sustain her. Hannah’s father has taken on a second job
as a security guard on weekends, and the additional pay barely helps
cover the expense.

What’s worse? Hannah’s 6-month-old sister has just started to show
the same symptoms Hannah once had.

How will a police officer — saving lives out on the streets –
afford to save his own child’s life?

Watch “World News with Charles Gibson” at 6:30 p.m. ET Thursday, Jan.
10.