Financial Alternatives.....

With the grim financial information that we have gathered, we have obviously come to the conclusion that we need to do some serious work on balancing the budget.  I don't know anyone in any profession who can cough up an extra $2900/month for any length of time.

I am still disabled.  So I am unable to pick up extra work, which would actually come close to closing that gap.  Hubby is really really needed at home to take care of babygirl so I can continue my almost-full-time work and maintain our health insurance. So we have no immediate way to increase income.

So...cut expenses.  We have already started this process.  We live in a two family house and have been using it as a one family, and are rapidly prepping it to return to two family status.  This will increase our income by $700, and decrease our expenses by $200 (one less power bill).  We are negotiating with our insurance.  Turns out that if you argue a bit, they decrease the copayment for out-of-town specialists (if we don't have one like it in town) and dialysis to $25, so that decreases dialysis costs from $2250/month to $750, and saves us over $100/month on doctor visits.  They will also pick up $900 of the $1000 copay for the surgery, eventually.

And, in two months, she will qualify for Medicare, which will pick up all of our dialysis costs!  Whoohoo!  So we have to hang on, fight, argue, fax, keep copies of EVERYTHING, document, document, document.

And survive.

DeeDee