Three weeks – Are you kidding me?

July 8, 2013 – The waiting was killing me. When will they set the date for surgery? Will it be next week? Am I prepared? I finally get the call from Ilene at Dr. Shapiro's office. The surgery was scheduled for July 30th at 8am. July 30th? That's three weeks away. Are you kidding me? Nope, July 30th. They not only needed to coordinate their schedules, it was the middle of summer, which meant vacations. And the kicker is I had my pre-op appointment with Dr. Vinas the following Monday and they wanted to entire payment in full. How am I going to pull $4500 out of my ass in one week? Fortunately for me, my wonderful life-long friend Tova set up a fundraising sight for me and she and my other friends spread the word. Although I was uncomfortable with the idea, I felt blessed that so many people reached out to me. I was able to spread the payments out to half on July 15th and the balance on July 22nd. I cleared out my business and personal checking and ran up what little credit card I had to put down the deposit. But I did it! By the time the next week rolled around Tova was able to get an advance on the fundraising account. She paid Dr. Vinas directly and I paid the remaining $167. What a huge sigh of relief. This is really going to happen! Over those three weeks, I was busy researching grants, I applied for a forbearance on my mortgage, went to my church for help and continued going to all my Doctors appointments and got a lot of needed work done around my house. Although the waiting was hard, it really turned out to be good timing. I got to celebrate my girl's 18th birthday. It was a special night, with special people. <3

I am truly blessed.