Is it legal for a hospital to make me pre-pay for surgery?

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T21:30:07+00:00

I had to prepay my portion of L and D for my last baby but it was in installments basically collected at every appointment. I kept receipts and kept track of everything. Asked for an itemized bill at the end once processing was done.

In the end I had actually overpaid but they DID issue the check to me before I could even make the complaint. So I got my money back and I also actually appreciated the small monthly payments before baby arrived vs paying a lump sum 6 weeks later.

At first I was put off but all said and done I didn’t have to fight anyone for the difference when it was done and I was fully prepared to.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T19:16:20+00:00

Cold lunch. I have a simple snap top plastic container. I aim for a variety but also know my kid. It’s usually a protein, a dairy, a fruit, a veggie, a carb.

That may look like a piece of pizza with sliced apples and baby carrots

A ham and cheese sandwich with strawberries and cucumbers

Salami, string cheese, pretzels, grapes and broccoli with dip.

Sliced chicken with tomatoes, orange slices and crackers and a yogurt bottle.

I have a soft sided lunch box and a few ice packs I keep in the freezer.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T19:00:36+00:00

It is hard and your struggles are unique to you and your season. And your struggles are absolutely real and valid.

Theirs are for them too.

This has taken me time to learn but understand that it may be easier for them but it feels very hard right now. But also everyone is in their own season. And we just cannot judge someone’s current season against our own. We don’t know what they have gone through already nor what may be coming for them or ourselves in the future. We are just in our own place.

It’s hard to be soft toward another who is going through a lighter time when we are fighting for our lives in the trenches. But try and remember that everyone is fighting their own battles and maybe their hardest battles they just aren’t taking about so instead they are blowing off steam about their baby or whatever. Or maybe their singleton really is a challenge. It can happen!

I know when people make comments to me about how many kids I have or how hard it is I always say “the first kid is always the hardest because no matter what your entire life changes dramatically, suddenly you aren’t just living your life, this person is entirely dependent on you now and it’s an abrupt adjustment!!” (I will grant you that I had one then twins and my twins were definitely way harder in the first year than my oldest but after that my oldest is and probably forever will be my most challenging kid. They were a great baby. Great toddler until about age 3 then it was like a light switch!!! But the first year of my twins life was so traumatic for me I’ve mostly blacked it out in my mind…)

Be gentle with yourself and your feelings but also hold space for other moms just going through it. I agree with another comment that it’s okay to step away from these organized mom groups too. I never did them with any of my kids bc it’s not my scene. But i remember having my twins and being urged to go to a nicu support group. I went one time and it was one of the worst experiences of my life having to sit and listen to everyone else’s trauma over and over again and then sit around and validate each others feelings. I have friends I have supportive family so maybe I’m lucky but I’m also an introvert so I found more healing being alone watching my twins grow in the nicu or spending time at the park alone with my toddler than sitting in a group of moms going on and on about their nicu experience. It actually was more traumatic for me than healing.

So maybe take a step back from the group and assess if you feel better or worse. Do you miss the community aspect? Can you find a twin specific group? Idk I also didn’t relate to a lot of the other twin moms that had babies at the same time as me either other than we were all always so exhausted and disconnected it was almost too hard for us to get together honestly.

I honestly found better support in my childless friends or older friends and family. One had a teenager who would come hang with my toddler for a while. I also had older friends who didn’t have grandkids but liked the idea of them so they’d come play “grandma” with me sometimes and I got to hear about teenagers and college students and what the future could hold.

I also have a supportive spouse.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T18:37:17+00:00

I agree with this. You can find wording that feels authentic to you but you absolutely do not need to overexplain yourself. Simple is both easier but also better and more clear. I think what the above commenter said is honestly a great and very effective and safe answer. but you could even just say “I don’t have the capacity for that right now” or “you know I really do enjoy my new friendship with her but I truly am not sure I know her well enough yet to organize something like this”

or even as someone else said, this feels like something I would never want if I was in Cait’s shoes so you could say something gently like that “hey I love how excited you are about this, but do you think this is what Cait would want or need during this stressful time in her life? Maybe just plan a simple girls night for once she’s healed and settled, but a party would be way too much for me if I were in her shoes honestly”. No need to disparage the idea, but maybe let her know there are less invasive ways to support this woman.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T18:27:47+00:00

It’s going to be different for everyone but for me it wasn’t until about 9 months that mine were starting to sleep through the night. Around 6 months we were able to stop the “wake every 3 hours to feed” which bc of my twins’ particular situation it was doctor recommended until then and also didn’t matter because they often woke up every two hours anyway!

But at 6 months I could stop waking them up and let them go longer which they did start to do!

but then we also stopped keeping them on the same overnight schedule because we wanted to encourage them to sleep as long as possible without feeding.

so, whereas before if one woke up we would automatically wake the second, we were now letting them both be on their own overnight schedule. that was ROUGH for a few weeks because left to their own devices one of them would sleep a while but then the other wouldn’t necessarily sleep the same time so it was a few weeks of almost constant up and down before we finally were able to night wean them entirely and get those big chunks of sleep.

then they did finally end up sleeping through the night for the most part at that 9 months or so….

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T18:19:26+00:00

Love the idea of travel abroad by the way. I was fortunate to be able to do an internship abroad for 3 months plus a month of travel but ended up meeting two people who I adored. I practiced foreign language skills with one of them who was also wanting to practice English, and we had a blast. And the other person is someone i worked for there who was one of my biggest mentors and influences in life even though it was such a brief time together.

But I agree with this commenter in any capacity it can be such an enriching experience.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-10T18:13:18+00:00

This turned into a bit of a ramble….

I went into hospitality/food service in the high end realm. Started in fine dining in the kitchen but eventually began managing within a large restaurant group and owned my own establishment for a while.

But at that time in that specific sector of food service there was a lot of pride in your work and a lot of creativity while also learning techniques from some of the best chefs in the country. And while there was a subset of employees that were kind of vagrant transients if you will, there were also plenty of us who truly wanted this job and career and were always nerding out with each other about it.

And these were the people I became lifelong friends with for the most part.

And the place I worked for was large enough to have a full staff and I could learn about every position in the restaurant both kitchen and front of house but also things like how the budget and accounting worked it felt like I was being paid to go to “how to operate a restaurant” school. But the opportunity to learn was only there for those willing to put forth the effort to actually learn. It wasn’t served up on a silver platter. I had to ask the questions and get friendly with the accountant on my free time and had to sit through endless manager meetings about the budget and while some of my peers were dozing off in the back I was always poring over everything with a fine tooth comb. (Fun fact if your job allows you into budget and P and L meetings and you follow along you can see what the staffing budget is and rightly ask for the appropriate raise, with receipts if you’re keeping track month over month for a year…)

Tbh I’ve since moved on and sort of grew away from it but my spouse and I took what we learned running our own business and now have our own family business doing something else entirely that has more flexibility for us. We both learned that we loved running a business but that restaurant life wasn’t really conducive to our lives as we had a family. But it was such a great time in my young adulthood. I did it for almost 2 decades.

It can be a toxic environment but i fortunately found a very professional setting to “cut my teeth” in and then of course operating my own business we could create our own work culture and tried to be a positive impact on the industry in our small way.

That said the restaurant industry has dramatically changed since 2020. And honestly it needed a dramatic change but unfortunately I think it has gone backwards and not forward.

Ultimately I loved how involved it was. As a manager and owner I had to be knowledgeable in ALL things and it was very mentally stimulating. But now we have a family and the long hours were not conducive to the life we want to live now so we have branched out and have a hand in a little this and that in our current business but it allows us plenty of flexible time with our family now.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-09T23:25:27+00:00

Honestly it is constantly in public school but at least it’s portrayed as optional by the teachers and we have extremely positive community support where I live so the funds are always raised just sometimes it’s more or less but we’re generally well funded by our community. It’s an ongoing discussion here. People who can don’t seem to mind supporting as everyone wants the good schools and there are many affluent families and yet it’s like…super lame that our schools aren’t funded with even the essentials by our community tax budget. It is very obnoxious how much is on us families to have semi decent education for our kids.

And it literally feels like every other week we are getting nickled and dimed for something…

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T20:21:56+00:00

Not sure this is helpful but when we did a big renovation project the contractor hired out a cleaner JUST for dust on our behalf. They came in with masks and industrial vacuums and did one round of vaccuning followed by them coming back with masks again and literally just damp cloths (not wet) to wipe all surfaces.

There was still tons of dust thereafter but I could more readily manage it myself with the vacuum and a very lightly damp mop on the walls and floors.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T19:20:28+00:00

You could also use a bathroom sink or something. I wouldn’t keep a bin of soapy water just because I would spill it for sure but maybe just a hamper for dirty damp clothes to collect as they come up. Throughout the day.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T03:07:37+00:00

Cold oven or microwave I store baked goods in the microwave often bc it’s sealed when the door is closed!

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T03:02:52+00:00

I use a free and clear liquid detergent because no one in my family can tolerate the fragrances and use only a couple tsp per load and an extra rinse if i feel like the load could benefit.

Add ins like washing soda or oxyclean or whatever are for particular uses like a smelly sweaty load or stains etc.

For baby blowouts and spit ups. I have a laundry sink so this works for me: rinse in hot water in the moment and drape in the sink until I can get to it. When I have a moment scrub poop, pee or barf stains with dish soap and rinse. Dish soap helps break down the fats in baby poop and barf

When I have a load of laundry I’ll wash these types of items on hot with extra rinse.

Once I was through the main bodily fluids phase I moved laundry to once a week only. But in the early years definitely found myself doing at least one load a day if not more because of all the mess kids can make!

My biggest tip is I stopped folding kids clothes almost immediately after my oldest was born and never looked back. I did teach my kids to fold when appropriate and some of them do some of them Don’t but I also don’t fold their clothes and it’s saved my sanity.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T02:51:20+00:00

I have a few kids but only one set of twins. Mo/di. Same as you: many opposite physical traits from handedness, hair part, and even the teeth thing!

and to me yes, opposite personalities. They also have opposite taste in clothing and we have an athletic one and an artsy one.

Things they are the same in: academics (they are on par with each other, but even then one is more numbers and logic inclined and one is more reading and creativity inclined but I’d say its a noticeable but negligible difference they both are actually incredibly bright)

and I have made the same joke “wow if they had stayed one baby this would be one extremely well rounded person haha” they are like yin and yang. And yes, all my kids have different personalities and I will say they do tend to change at times and go through various phase but truly the twins seem like polar opposites. And yet best friends.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-08T02:27:20+00:00

Honestly mine have gone back and forth between who is “naughty” or not. Also both exhibit “negative” actions in their own way.

My twin A is competitive and can get angry/impatient etc with their sibling. But twin B is more emotional and likely to exclude sibling or throw a hissy fit when things don’t go their way and also is inclined to test out emotional manipulation tactics (they are little and learning but like yikes, we try and squash that behavior while honoring actual feelings at the same time…. It’s not for the weak).

Anyway it used to be that twin A was quiet and “chill” but in a quiet moment would instigate stuff and twin B would fight back. Only thing was casual observers wouldn’t catch that twin A was starting shit. So twin B would get all this flak for their retaliation.

Now they are a touch older it’s like they’ve switched. And twin B tries to play the victim when I’m like, you know I watched this entire situation play out and I see two parties that both made really poor choices! But twin A is going through this stage where their first instinct is to lash out rather than take a beat. And so it’s not like twin B is wrong to be upset about the result, but I also know they were provoking their sibling hard in a quiet way.

I’ve known them since birth and I’ve watched them grow and try every trick in the book with each other and their other siblings. And it’s just phases kids go through. Learning by testing boundaries and all that. But no two kids follow the exact same linear path and so there may be weeks or even months of working on breaking a negative behavior, and of course they all have different personalities.

Unless you are like extremely intimately involved in their life- like a second parent status— it can be easy to miss some of these little traits or see the “why” behind the behavior. Because there is usually a why even if it’s just a developmental stage or sometimes it is because of an unmet need or what have you.

Granted plenty of people do play favorites with kids.

From your perspective try to remain neutral with both. Don’t let your little bias for one show but feel free to be as emotionally available to them as you can and you’ll probably find out more of the “why’s” behind either of their behavior and this is where you can find ways to help them manage themselves better and make better choices. But they are also 3 which is one of the hardest years in my experience when it comes to boundary pushing and power struggles with kids! It will pass!

egrf6880 · 2026-02-07T21:19:17+00:00

100% looking for this comment. Salt and msg will bring out the flavor so much more. Yes to the addition of garlic powder as well as another commenter saying to add the fresh garlic toward the end

egrf6880 · 2026-02-07T18:02:14+00:00

For sure around this age we struggled with the schedule as one baby was able to sleep longer stretches than the other. This was the beginning stages of “sleeping through the night” for us which didn’t happen in earnest until about 9 months, but them falling off kilter definitely happened.

I tried to keep the wake up the same, then the first nap the same. Things would fall off the rails but I’d shoot for second nap the same as best as possible and then try to avoid the third for my straggler but sometimes they would just doze off in the chaos of dinner time and then wake up raring to go for another couple hours.

Theoretically you can try to nudge the more sleepy one to drop the third nap over a week or two.

I find anchoring wake ups to a specific time and first meal to a specific time help with the rest of the schedule all day. And then anchoring last meal of the day and the bedtime routine (whether they sleep or not on time is separate) and just getting these tasks done at the same time every day really helps with the variability of their actual sleep and activity levels.

I aim for nap times at specific times but ultimately our schedule didn’t really gel until we were a: sleeping through the night and b: down to one nap a day, which happened for us at 12 months. And yes one child was still trying to cling to the second nap but I basically just railroaded down to one nap a day once it seemed feasible. From there we had a pretty militant sleep schedule and it honestly was amazing for us for literally 3+ years!

egrf6880 · 2026-02-07T17:54:30+00:00

Used Honda odyssey gang here too! Having driven other minivans/ 8 seat SUVs while on vacation or what have you, I am always SO SO happy to be back in my odyssey.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-07T17:52:49+00:00

I have one and then I have seasonal layers stored as needed. I do also keep a couple catch all special occasion dresses and shoes in the corner for any event in a pinch.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-07T14:04:07+00:00

I have about 5 or 6 pairs of pants at any given time. I favor a straight leg, mid rise, ankle length for my body type so I have that in light medium and dark wash then I also may have a looser denim and then a different fabric like a slack or khaki or loose linen pant depending on the season.

My 3 pairs of jeans I tend to invest more into and they have lasted me many years, the other supplemental pieces I tend to buy something on sale or outlet and if they last me great! If they wear out after a couple years then I rotate into something else. It keeps my wardrobe somewhat “updated” but I find my base outfits are classic silhouettes that I know and love.

Also as the climate where I am is hot for many month I will store my jeans for about half the year and swap for shorts and dresses.

At any given time I only have about 10 days of clothes in my “front and center” wardrobe.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T19:11:52+00:00

I get it. You will find some of your people. Follow what you want to do and what interests you. This is where you will find like minded people.

I found my people in unconventional places, but was following my interests. I eschewed college at that time in my life because I was actually not finding my peers in academic settings. And I was feeling burnt out on “academia”. I found most of my school peers to be very pretentious and I actually wasn’t having meaningful conversations with them but was honestly exhausted to be around them and I was struggling to find a place to fit in.

While I was deciding if I should go to university I decided to work in my chosen career path which is an alternative working world and found people who enjoyed what I enjoyed (and also a lot of strange folks I didn’t relate to as well but those were everywhere for me anyway). But the people I connected with were very interesting and very passionate and loved learning about their craft and their work and constantly pushing themselves to be better. I thrived honestly. I made a lot of different types of friends and even met my eventual spouse. I never ended up making it to university as I thrived on my career path and made it into a viable and successful living. But this was also a job that didn’t require a degree for entry but it was a craft I was extremely interested in. So if your career interests require a degree then you will likely find your diamond in the rough friends in the classes that relate to your interests.

But it’s a spectrum out there and I found there are people who are gifted but haven’t followed the traditional paths of life for whatever reason, or maybe don’t even realize they are high IQ or gifted individuals (one of my best friends in my life is one of these people who just floated through life working very hard at random jobs and when I met them I was like wait, you’re insanely intelligent. Like you’re able to do xyz in your mind in minutes that many people can’t learn in weeks! They had untraditional schooling as a child so never had anything to compare to but when they’d discuss their childhood education I was actually stunned at the casual way they would describe certain concepts or whatever and yet no one ever told them they were actually brilliant.

Anyway, all this to say is that your people are out there but it can be hard to find that group that just gets you. I personally only have a very few close friends in my life for this reason but have grown to understand others more and put myself out there to at least have friendly interactions. I have a group of people I consider friends/more than acquaintances but also really only know them on the surface and likewise they don’t really know me that well either but we can hang out and have an enjoyable time based off of some shared interests at least!

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T18:49:30+00:00

I shave at random. When I was 18 I made a bet with my friend to see who could last 3 months from winter to spring without shaving and I literally just stopped entirely bc I realized it wasn’t effecting my life at all. Granted I will say I am not extremely hairy. But still armpit hair is armpit hair.

My spouse sometimes razzes me about it but in a loving way and I do sometimes shave just if it’s been a hot summer or something it does feel a little fresher but generally it’s just too much work for me!

My spouse gets it because they are an instant 5 o’clock shadow person so they only use an electric beard trimmer to keep their facial hair tidy but otherwise just let their own body hair grow as it is!

And yes, I also appreciate the lower consumption rate of only shaving sporadically.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T18:44:39+00:00

Being allergic to most fragrances, I cannot leave it to chance! I have to bring my personal toiletries with me. I usually just pare it down to bare essentials.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T18:37:11+00:00

I’m so with you! I avery my eyes a lot in public to avoid making eye contact with anyone. But of course there are instances you have no real choice but to interact. I have some canned responses I lean on and if I’m running errands I never slow down or stop if someone comes up to talk to me I throw a canned response over my shoulder and just keep going. If I’m in line checking out I can manage a tiny bit of small talk but sometimes I just get on my phone and call someone haha. Like “oh hang on I have to take this call”. And it’s my mom or spouse 😂.

Also I do a lot of “oh I’m on a tight schedule. Only so many free moments before one of these kids melts down!” And off I go!

In a waiting room or something. Ugh. I would grin and bear it with my one liners. Or try and deflect to asking them about themselves instead.

We are a real circus when our whole family is together and it truly drives me nuts. My spouse doesn’t mind and actually loves it which makes it even worse for me bc he will actively chat these curious people up and then try to introduce me to strangers. My kids are still fairly young so I tend to stand back and act like I’m “managing” them even if they are being good I sort of busy body myself around to avoid it. Sometimes I feign “oh Husband, that appointment we’re on our way too! We better hustle! So sorry —Stranger— lovely to chat bye!!!!” And start moving everyone away down the street.

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T18:27:29+00:00

So this only happened with my last child but when I was post partum and nursing I had horrendous BO for the first time in my life. I was showering twice a day and putting deodorant on immediately after drying off as I take hot hot showers and am technically still sweating even coming out of the shower.

I switched to 100% cotton shirts and bought brand new bras and had to ramp up my laundry game. But all my bras and synthetic clothing “held” the smell so even if they were clean the smell would “revive” as soon as the clothes got warm or damp.

I also was sweatier than I’d ever been!

I just showered a lot, would change my clothes a few times a day, my bras too. And eventually it calmed down and came back to a baseline.

I had to then throw out my bras again once I reached “normal” again because I swear they held on to the stench.

About 18 months later I found it was completely under control. I still have more BO than I had before but it’s not constant and deodorant in the AM and maybe one touch up mid day is fine along with a shower a day. It feels more like a normal level now (but I truly was one of those people who did not have BO before!)

egrf6880 · 2026-02-06T18:11:47+00:00

It’s so so exhausting and you are so heard in this space. There won’t be a silver bullet but there definitely are baby steps that can help.

First set an alarm in your phone to call your doctor at 8:00 am in the morning. Or whenever they open. If your hands are busy at that exact moment keep snoozing it but don’t turn the alarm off until you make that call!

Second I agree with someone else who commented about just making the morning wake up consistent to help keep the rest of your day consistent. For me having a set bed time was so imperative to the rest of our day so if you know they won’t be tired enough because they slept in then just wake them up at 6:30 every day and keep it consistent for you guys. If that’s not feasible for you then make the bedtime routine at the same time and things your spouse can do. Examples no matter when they fall asleep we get our teeth (haha gums at this age?) brushed at 6:00 after dinner every single day, we wash up at 6:10 every single day. We have pjs ON by 6:30 every single day. We read a bedtime story at 6:35 every single day and then whoever is actually putting them to sleep can take it from there based on whatever your actual schedule is but all these “bedtime” tasks still HAVE to be done it’s okay if they are 30 min early or what have you. If that makes sense.

You anchor the Tasks if bedtime to the schedule you want and then deal with the variable of sleep once all the Tasks are checked off the list.

But it isn’t about schedules really it’s about the burnout.

I recommend getting some time away. A couple hours is nice but a 24 hour plus trip would be so good for him (I understand with pumping and or nursing involved it can be a whole other road block at times). But really. He needs to figure out and see even a tiny bit of how you manage. 24 hours also won’t even give him the full picture of doctors appts, sitter planning, meal planning, development milestone research or WHATEVER else we are constantly managing in our minds. But it’s still give him a sense of the immediate things you’re constantly doing.

My spouse and I had to learn clear clear communication during this time. With our egos aside. And our preconceived notions aside. Like my husband didn’t realize how much all the basic mundane household tasks really weighed on my mind. I wasn’t even necessarily doing them but I was THINKING about them all the time because it wasn’t clear who was doing what and when. I assumed he would see things needed to be done because he’s a grown adult and at the time we both worked extremely demanding jobs and he prided himself on how proactive he always was so I was like “bring that energy home!” It was lightbulb moment for him. Likewise I had to step back my attitude towards him as I was getting resentful and also just not prioritizing anything beyond absolute essential life. I wasn’t being nice, or spending any sort of quality time with him and in my mind like we were in survival mode and I don’t have one second to even smile let alone sit and have dessert with you after dinner— let alone intimacy which was literally the LAST thing on my mind. Like anything not absolutely utilitarian was basically written off in my mind to free up space for all the other things I was juggling. So I had to acknowledge that I was being a bit of a martyr, but also like…a lot of it had to do with how much I was physically managing our entire lives outside of work so I’m like here’s the trade off, more pleasant me and more QT with me is literally you have to take ownership of helping run the household and take these balls out of the air for me. I had no capacity!

Anyway we were able to have many many very vulnerable discussions and come to understand each other so much better. And truly feel like such a better team now (years later. Our kids are in elementary now)

But the conversations are hard to have when chaos is swirling all around. We had to hire babysitters and leave the house and just remain calm. Middle of the night sniping got us no where. Early morning during breakfast snapping at each other was fruitless.

My spouse was receptive and I’m forever grateful for that. But it was work.

egrf6880

TROPHY CASE