10% of adults in the us have outstanding medical debts greater than $250 according to the most recent US Census Bureau. Unfortunately, medical bills are both common and confusing. Today on the Debt Free Mom Podcast, Lindsey joins us to talk about the hard reality of learning how to navigate medical bills and advocate well for her family. Lindsey is a married mom of two boys who works in talent acquisition for a major tech company, and in the last few years could have added "navigate the US medical billing system" to her resume.
Carly Hill: Lindsey, I'm so grateful that you are willing to come on. Could you share just a little background about what led you into this topic and wanting to talk to other people about this same thing?
Lindsey Thomason: Yeah, for sure. Thanks, Carly. Thanks for having me. So two years ago, my son, he was four and a half at the time. He was hospitalized for just about three weeks, 17 days for E coli infection that led to kidney failure. And so when you had reached out or, you know, put a question up about kind of unique situations, I thought this is one that's always been really heavy on my heart.
I had a lot of therapy sessions about it because I just was like, people don't understand when they are planning for things that medical expenses can pertain to very healthy children, too. I think that when we plan for emergency funds and different things, we look at, like, oh, my husband needs a knee replacement at 45 or, you know, oh, my kid broke an arm and needed surgery.
And you don't think of, like, these very sudden things happening to your young, healthy children. So, I just figured it was it was a great topic and I have a good story and I kind of have a lot to say about it.
Carly Hill: I think that is so important because a lot of times when we're especially like people will ask me, like, how much should I have in my emergency fund?
And so you kind of talk through some of these risk factors with like, how many income streams do you have and do you own your house or rent it? But like what you're saying too is like it can also just come out of the clear blue. Like it can be something that is like you said totally healthy people you know you could have like a newer house, newer cars, and you could still be faced with something that is a large unexpected expense and especially in in health care, I think that is true too even something that's not necessarily illness, but like a broken bone or something.
I mean, my, my two year old broke a bone falling down a couple stairs, like just a couple of steps. And so it is so true that if you, if you have a body and you have other people that have a body in your home, that the chances are pretty good that at some point you will face something much larger than you may be anticipated just based on looking at everyone.
Lindsey Thomason: And I think medical is one area where when you think about emergency fund, you think car, you're like, okay, you can gauge how much you would need if you needed to replace the car. You think home, I know what an HVAC unit costs or a roof costs. You can gauge those costs when you're looking at saving and putting away. And you can't do that for medical. You have no clue what those bills are going to look like or, or what, what the medical case is going to be.
Carly Hill: Yeah, even once you know, like, okay, you know, he has this infection and you know, he's going to need this treatment. You still have no idea what those are going to be and they can bill you years down the road, you know, like all of that can become such a giant question mark.
So, as you guys navigated that, what are some of the things that you learned to do in order to manage those finances, make sure you weren't being overbilled, double billed what are some of the things that you now know are important to do?
Lindsey Thomason: So the first thing I learned was that they're going to start billing you the second that you walk, you know, either walk out the door or get admitted, and so we were receiving bills before he had even been discharged for, like, those early days of ER trips.
And ultimately, I just was like, overwhelmed. I was like, I can't think about this right now. I need to focus on my kids health. I need to make sure my kids going to make it through this. But I think one of the things that we learned once those started coming in were I started a spreadsheet right away because I knew, and I've been down this road before with having babies or other minor things, 99 percent of the time, those bills are inaccurate. 99 percent of the time, people just pay them. And I just knew I was like, I have to track every every penny. And now we're talking like, this was language I didn't understand. So things are being built and coded.
I became very good friends with the health insurance company because I really, I leaned on them to look at like, is this accurate? Is this not? But I think the biggest thing was just understanding the line items, understanding what was being billed. And now we had a unique case where for probably 12 days of those 17 days, his care was the exact same and it was mostly supportive care.
So it was, it was him just laying there, making sure that he was going to survive to the next day. And then once we got into dialysis, that was different, but it made it easier for me to look at those bills knowing like, okay, these days they didn't do anything. But ultimately, one of the biggest things that we learned was when you're in an emergency situation, like we were, you don't have control over who your provider is going to be, or my son needed a ambulance transfer from one hospital to the other.
And that that ambulance was not in network, but we didn't have a choice and you don't have a choice and also you're sitting there like my, my child is lifeless and I just need to get to an ambulance. So there were so many things that we learned of things that we could control and things that we couldn't and we had to really hold on to the ones that we could control and the ones that we couldn't, I had to make sure to note to go back afterwards and fight those because there is a case for somebody whose child is lifeless going into kidney failure and needing an ambulance transfer, and I didn't have a choice of what ambulance he was getting put into.
Carly Hill: Sure. So what, when you were like looking at some of those bills, what made you clue into the idea that there could be things wrong? Like, did you just right off the bat notice like, oh, blatantly he did not have this service or how did you start to identify?
Because I'm sure, like you said, people get bills all the time and they're just like, well, this is just the bill. This is how it goes. So what are some things that you paid attention to that made you be like, oh, I don't think this is correct?
Lindsey Thomason: So for there were two of them. So for the first one was the ambulance bill and the cost of it was astronomical. He had no care. He just had a transfer. And so that was the first thing that tipped me off on that. I was like, this can't be right. And also I was like, I'm not paying this. I mean, there's just no way I'm paying this bill. The second one was the hospital bill was so high, a portion of it that we owed.
And, and I, I want to say my husband and I are both corporate America working employees. We have good health insurance. And it was so high out of pocket cost. And I called; I called the insurance company and I said, there's no way that this is right. Like there's some, there's an error here. What could it be?
And it was on the phone for hours and they identified that they insurance was denying the the claim of the line item for him to have had a private room. So basically they were saying he did not need a private room. You asked for a private room and you need to foot that bill. And it took two years. Oh, not the ambulance bill took 2 years. The hospital bill took probably like 18 months for me to finally get the hospital on the phone to to show that they had coded it incorrectly. And he had a highly contagious disease that. You know, every time somebody was in and out of the room, they were putting on their gear and whatnot.
So, It just took phone calls and phone calls and phone calls and it took me tracking every single note in every single phone call and it also just took being a mama and like No one's gonna tell me no when it comes to my kid.
Carly Hill: Yeah, and I think so we have another episode coming out about medical and we talked about a very similar thing where it's insane how the patient is put in the position of having to be the expert of having to say, like, No, this is what happened.
And now I'm going to connect you with this person to prove this because it's wild how inaccurate they're allowed to be. And then we have to be the ones to catch the error when we have no medical knowledge at all. And also when it's like not our job, like you have a full time job. And then you took you basically take on a part time job of investigating these medical bills and making sure everyone is doing things accurately. And I think that is, I, in theory, I think, I think all of us would agree that that definitely needs to change the medical landscape of the way things are billed in the United States and what we're responsible for needs to change.
But in the meantime, we need to be critical thinkers and advocating for ourselves in the process to not get swept up with paying for things that we don't.
Lindsey Thomason: So that's it and I needed to make sure I was on top of everything because that ambulance bill did go to collections because I was like, it was billed wrong. I've had all these phone calls. And even though it wasn't covered by insurance, there was some, like, discount that they were giving for, I think it was $500 and no warning, nothing that bill went to collections. And so then I was in a position to, okay, I need to pay that bill immediately so that that doesn't sit, you know, with collections and then continue fighting it.
And so, after that, I realized that the larger one which I think was about 7000 dollars, I needed to understand every step of the way, how much time do I have before you're going to send this bill to collections? Or how much do I have to pay on this bill before you're going to send this off so that I could keep buying myself time?
And I, I was able to get with that hospital when I was able to get them to a point where they put a hold on it so that there was no risk of it going to collections.
Carly Hill: I've had to do that before too, where, which again, it's just so hard to, because I think about people who maybe don't have just the time or the awareness that this is something you can do, but it's so hard when you are put in the position of having to do that when it feels like it should be the responsibility of the insurance company speaking to the medical biller to be like, Oh, we're looking into this, but it's just not the case like you really do become the one that is the middleman between those two.
Lindsey Thomason: Yeah, and just one of the other things I would just keep calling until I found people that were nice like representatives that were nice and like willing to help and then when I would get them on the phone, then I would really dive into it because I think that's another huge factor is like, you get people on the phone that were just, you know, I don't know, that's the way the hospital build it, so I can't change like, well, there's somebody that can change.
Carly Hill: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And, and really having, I feel like I've learned, like I've never worked in like telephone customer service, but I feel like I myself have learned like just the tone of voice that it takes to get that done of being like really clear, calm, kind, but assertive.
Like you have to really be like, I am not accepting your first answer. I'm I want to talk to whoever is able to change this. But not in a way that like arms someone's defenses to where they don't want to help you, which is so challenging. Another thing I've learned to and maybe you've I think you mentioned this is that unlike a credit card bill or a car bill or something, if you pay almost anything towards it, then they delay sending you to collection. So like if you're like, okay, this provider was billed wrong or something. I mean, you could have a very large bill and be like, I will pay $40 onto that bill while I'm trying to figure things out. And they're so much less likely to send you to collections than if you've never paid them a penny.
Have you experienced that?
Lindsey Thomason: So it no, yes and no. So, the hospital was very firm on if that's the path you want to take, then you need to sign up for a payment plan and that's going to be based on your income. Okay. And they said to me right on the phone, if you know right out the gates that your income is going to be too high to get you on a payment plan, then they will not be approved.
And it was like this long drawn out process. I was like, I'm not going to, I'm not going to go through that. But I do. I have had experiences in other cities and medical facilities where they will allow you to. Just pay a little bit of it.
Carly Hill: Be flexible. And yeah, yeah. So one of the things you mentioned in your application was that you said that there's money that you fought and never got back. And then money that you did fight for and get back. So what were some of the things that maybe. You had to do in order because I feel like that is much harder once you pay money They're so much less likely to get it back. What were some of the things you had to do to prove that that money was owed back to you?
Lindsey Thomason: So what's funny about that question is that after this application like days later, two plus years after my son's medical emergency, we got that money back. But it So that was the ambulance bill, and it was a matter of, of every excuse that they would give me, or every time I would call, they would say it's with corporate, it's with corporate, we've approved it on our end, it's with corporate, and I ended up I've done this in other areas of my life where I wasn't getting a response, I reached out to the CEO of the ambulance company on LinkedIn, and I was like, you know what, it doesn't hurt whether that helped or not, I don't know, but they, in this case, they were in agreeance that they owed that money back to me, they just were not paying it. And so then they did pay it and they refunded it to an HSA card from two years ago that it was paid on. So that HSA card was no longer active.
Carly Hill: I was going to say it probably doesn't exist.
Lindsey Thomason: Exactly. So then, but they were not willing to help and I just didn't give up. I just kept calling and eventually. I called insurance and I said, is there any chance that this money went back to this HSA card? It could be sitting in an account somewhere. And it was, it was sitting in an account. And they were able to transfer it over to link back to the other HSA card that is active. And you know, that money's now there and it's sitting there for, for medical expenses.
But again, it was just a matter of like the, the drive to not stop. And it got to a point Carly, where the ambulance bill was $500. And I mean, like, It's still $500. Right. It was principal. And it got to a point where my husband was like, your time is money, your time. And I'm like, but I cannot let them win. I need this to be part of my story so that other people realize like you can win.
And I mentioned at the beginning of my therapy session, I had a long session around like sadness for people who would not be able to afford medical bills and I was like, I'm fighting for those people for the people who need the information needs the guidance of of what what to do and what to look for because $500 is $500.
Carly Hill: And I, when I do it, I feel I think about the same thing of people who don't have the resources, time, experience, whatever it is in order to do that. And I'm like, if I can be a chink in the armor of the insurance company to realize, Oh, we can't do this and get away with it all the time, then I will take up that cause.
Even if like, I'm sure that my husband would say the same thing of like, at some point you need to let it go. And it was just like, no, because there are people who can't afford to let it go. You know?
As a practical matter, when you're, so you're mentioning a lot of phone calls, what did you do to either like keep records or like, were there certain things that needed to be like in writing versus phone call?
So just practically speaking, how can people go about this communication process in order to prove themselves?
Lindsey Thomason: So what I did was I kept an ongoing email string to myself for every phone call I made. And the first thing I would say in every phone call was, what's your name again? And I would write their name down within that email string, I would write every note from that call, whether it was like progress or not.
I would always write, you know, the confirmation number or whatever the code was or the number they gave you. Anything I needed to know, and I kept it in one email string, like I said to myself, so that I had one area I need to reference back. And it was just easy because then I could, if I was on my computer or my phone, wherever I was, I knew I always had that with me.
And it came in handy a lot because I could then just like, go into that email string quickly scroll through see who I spoke to, find the confirmation numbers, find verbatim what they told me the last time I spoke to them. And, you know, they're doing the same thing. Like, yeah, the exact same thing. And so for me to like, show up and be like, Hey, you're not gonna try to pull one over on me.
I have all the same notes as you, I think definitely worked in my favor with the hospital bill, because they were the ones that just kept being like, nope, sorry. And I was just like, well, this is what you told me last time. And this is what they said. And this is who they reached out to. And I did everything they told me to do.
So that was a big one for me tracking kind of the notes. And then I think I mentioned, I did start a spreadsheet tracking any payments that I was making so that I knew exactly how much they would owe me back if I did end up winning these cases.
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So now, like, as you, like you said, two years of managing all of those bills really from one event. Now, moving forward, have you found yourself approaching new medical bills differently? Like, is there something, is there anything that you now do to be more proactive about, like, Okay, I'm not going to assume that this is right. Like, how do you now approach other things maybe unrelated to that initial event?
Lindsey Thomason: Yeah. So, one thing I did learn was what my benefits covered. And so now I submit everything for reimbursement because you just never know anything out of pocket, you know, chiropractor, acupuncture, like you just never know. And if you've hit your deductible or not, I think I just have a better, and I, I should say, I do work in HR, have a little bit of an HR background.
But I understand the coverage way more than I ever did before. And I haven't had many, knock on wood but I did have one ER bill and I lost that case, which was fine. You're not going to win them all, but I question everything. I still, I will look through every bill line by line. I will make sure that there's nothing in there that doesn't seem to make sense. If there is, I will call about it. Okay. But in that one, like I said, I, I did fight that one, but I, I ultimately lost.
It was out of network. It was an emergency situation. Like it was, you know, not that expensive, but fortunately we have not had anything this severe. You know, we've had our well checks and that kind of thing. And my son does have a yearly checkup, but that's pretty standard what they do. Like, you know, standard testing, blood draw, that kind of thing.
Carly Hill: So what would you recommend to someone who's like, Oh, I get medical bills all the time and I've never questioned anything. Would you recommend waiting until something is confusing or just going ahead and calling? Because a lot of times I think what the holdup is, and I feel this way often, is I don't even know what I don't know.
So like a lot of times when I look at a bill, I'm like, I don't even know what these words mean. So even if I were to call, I don't even know what to ask. So what would you recommend someone ask, you know, if they get a bill and it has all these line items and they're like, well, I could be wrong or it could be right, but I don't know, what would you do?
Lindsey Thomason: So I would call, of course, and I will always say to them, "I need you to talk to me as if I was a kindergartner." And if you don't like the person you're talking to, or you feel that they're being rude, you can either say "I'm having a hard time understanding you" or "our communication styles are not fitting here. Is there somebody else that could walk me through this?" or just call back. Just keep calling until you get someone. But ultimately I will like, I have, I have memories of going through line by line with a lady on the phone and her looking up every single thing and explaining every single one to me.
And as she's explaining it, I'm jotting down the notes so that I remember what all those things mean. Everything down to like understanding your deductible, understanding out of network versus the network, you know, there's, there's such a wide range of, of understanding along those things. Like some people get it and some people don't. And if you don't, you have a right to understand it and just keep asking the questions.
Carly Hill: So when you say question it right away, when you get a bill, do you call the medical provider to ask questions or do you call insurance?
Lindsey Thomason: I always call insurance first, unless again, like the ambulance one, that was a really unique one where I knew the situation, but I always will call insurance first to ask what their perspective is on it.
Because I mean, they both, neither of them are perfect, right? The medical institution and the insurance company, but I do think that the insurance company, there's a little bit more of a personal relationship there because typically, your insurance is through an employer. Maybe not. Maybe it's, you know, it's just a more personal relationship and they're not moving as quickly, they're more willing to help you understand, and they will give you the language to then call the medical facility. That was helpful for me, because I was like, I also like, there's so much emotion in this, and I think that's something that people forget is like, sure, broken bone, a little bit of emotion. This was like, deeply, deeply emotional. This was the scariest thing I've ever experienced in my life. And like, I remember calling and just being like, I need you to tell me what to say, because I'm angry. I'm sad, you know, what do I say here? And they will give you those talk tracks.
Carly Hill: Okay. That's, that's really helpful too, because Yeah, like you said, I mean, so many medical situations are emotional in one way or another, even if it's emotional, happy with like your baby being born.
Mm-hmm. , but at the same time, then it's like your postpartum and the last thing you wanna be dealing with is all of these bills. And so having the clarity, you know, from an insurance company to know what to ask. I always do have in the back of my head, like, couldn't you just call them and talk to them?
But that's just, and
Lindsey Thomason: sometimes they'll, sometimes they'll, yes. And there's, there's times where so flip it talking to the hospital, there were times where I would say to them, this is what I've already said to the insurance company, and I need you to call them now. And they will. And again, but again, years, this took me and it took me finding the right person who was willing to help.
And I probably cried. I'm sure there was a time where I cried because I just was like, so overwhelmed. And I was like not feeling heard. And I think I just, I remember standing on the side of the beach on family vacation talking to a guy and I just started crying and he's like, I hear you. I'm going to help you.
And he did. Yeah, he got, he was the lead that I needed and it was just, it's just finding the right person and not being ashamed to keep finding the right person.
Carly Hill: And that's it. Yeah, that's another important point to is that it's easy to think that the person you're talking to is the voice of the company or is the voice of the medical bill or or the insurance and so sometimes it takes a reminder like what you're saying of like, oh, I could talk to two different people who work for the same company and get two completely different sets of help.
Which is again hard because then it's like luck of the draw with calling and am I going to get someone who is going to advocate for me or am I going to get somebody who even if it's just having a bad day and not interested in pursuing my leads. So I do think it's important to kind of sense that on the phone and if you're like okay, I've had more help than this before maybe this person isn't the right one for me, asking for someone else or just knowing that they're sitting in a call room of probably more than 100 people who are all answering the same questions, I could literally hang up, call right back again, and have somebody completely different.
Lindsey Thomason: And, and you will. And also just, I think, being compassionate to them. Like, that's probably not the world's greatest job. They get a lot of angry, disgruntled people, and so. You know, being kind even when you are angry is, yeah, it's a big,
Carly Hill: yeah, it's that really thin line of like, I'm going to be clear and I'm not going to back down.
But I'm also like one thing I always focus on and myself because I know I can, I can do it very easily is okay no matter how upset I get I'm going to really focus on keeping my tone of voice neutral. So even if like, even if I feel worked up about what they're saying that I really like hone in on exactly the way my voice sounds, so that at least I don't also get them riled up while I am also worked up.
Right. Which is hard to do. Very hard to do.
Lindsey Thomason: It is. It is. And you are trying to keep Yeah. Keep yourself regulated. Mm-hmm. while making. You know, forward progress here.
Carly Hill: Yeah, because everybody is having these competing priorities and it feels like you should be on the same team, but you're actually like not, you know, like the insurance company obviously wants to help you out with decreasing your medical bill.
But at the same time, once they see that something is going to be expensive, then they kind of switch from working towards getting the medical bill down to working towards putting it on to you. And so then it's, you just feel stuck between a rock and a hard place of like everybody wanting to work together, but at the same time, also there's this puck of responsibility that's kind of being passed in a circle over and over.
And if we do, you know, it's important to say it's not about trying to get all of those bills down to zero and never having to pay for anything. It's just not having to pay for something that you didn't agree to be responsible for. So like when we sign up for our policy and when we choose what level we want, if we have the option. Like we are taking on that responsibility that we will pay for that deductible or that out of pocket. We just don't want it to be something where because of our lack of medical code knowledge, we ended up paying for something that actually wasn't our responsibility.
Lindsey Thomason: And you bring up a good point on the deductible. So that's the other thing, something like this, a big, you know, medical emergency, you're likely going to hit your deductible. However, if those bills are already coming in and you're starting to pay them, you're then owed that money back too. And that was an area where I do remember calling insurance and saying, I've lost track of what I've paid what should be owed back to me and they went line by line so they can see it on their computer. I could see it on my account and we went line by line at like what the cutoff was and where I needed to start processing the refund for what I had overpaid. And it was actually insurance who told me. Do not pay a cent towards that hospital bill because it was coded wrong. And if they hadn't, if they hadn't said that to me, I would have started paying that for fear of it going to collections, you know, and and she, I remember the lady, I wish I could remember her name. I probably, well, I have it in my notes, but I, I can hear her voice too. It was just like, I remember her saying that and her saying. This is so strange that it was coded this way. And interestingly, not connected to this, but a couple of years prior to that, I had appendicitis and they, the hospital coded it as an elective surgery and the insurance lady was like, what?
Like, nobody, nobody chooses to have,
Carly Hill: yeah, nobody's like, " today I would like my appendix removed."
Lindsey Thomason: But it's like another great example of like, you've got to read these things because I could see so many people- I was one of them- just about to pay it. And then I was like, this seems odd. This seems high.
I had a friend who delivered her child in the car. And they billed her for labor and delivery. And she had to fight it and the insurance company was like, we are not paying that you like, there was like, we'll, we'll, we'll pay for the recovery, but the labor was not there.
Carly Hill: It's just the volume of bills and codes that they're working through is so high that actually the chances of having an error on something becomes so much greater.
Lindsey Thomason: Right. I know. It's so wild. And you know what? It's usually, it's usually human error. Hospital bill, they, I remember being on the phone with them and they would be like, Oh yeah, it's all noted in here. All the, what he had, all the care. That would definitely need a private room, but they coded it differently. So we don't know why I'm like, well,
Carly Hill: exactly. Yeah. And unfortunately, like we said, like, I would love if this wasn't like, if we didn't need to do a podcast episode about this, I would love that. But the reality is that the things that you experienced are far too common. So people listening, either they've already experienced this. And so they're like, yeah, that's what happened to me.
And now I know what to do, or maybe people haven't.. Like I know that a lot of times the people I think about are people who are healthy and not yet parents, but want to become parents. I like think of like that as kind of the ideal audience for this, because it's like just the number, even in well checks, the number of times that a baby and child goes to the doctor, just so much drastically increases the amount of medical bills that come your way that it is really important. And I would love if there are people who are listening who haven't yet experienced that I can kind of take this information on the front end so that whenever they do, it doesn't have to be a scramble of what am I supposed to do? Who am I supposed to call?
Especially for people who maybe in the past have just taken the bill at face value and just like paid it is like, Hey, like call about everything. It's worth your time. Like if, if one phone call ends up avoiding a couple thousand dollars, like that's the biggest phone call you've ever made in your life.
Lindsey Thomason: And you know, it's funny, you mentioned that about the labor, the the birth I was postpartum. I was like, I don't care whatever I had, maybe I get paid. And my husband was like, no, like we had the deductible. We should get this money back.
And so. And I'm remembering now we had to fight for so long and we did get that money back, but it took a long time. We joke now that, I mean, we, I think you have a great point about once you have children, you, you might and to understand this stuff a little bit more or a situation like this, but we make a joke that, you know, every, every new year, we're like, okay, this is the year we're not going to hit the deductible.
Like having a baby, then having a baby, then this, there's always something. So we're like, all right, maybe 2024 we will, we'll make it. Yeah, exactly. A lot of people don't even know what that means about what, you know, what does it mean to hit the deductible or not.
Carly Hill: Yeah. And to close the loop from the very beginning is having those emergency funds and we tend to think of other things as, as taking it. But if we have a pattern, you know, like you've mentioned several years in a row, it's like, oh, maybe I should make sure to structure my finances in a way that basically just assumes I'm going to have to pay the deductible and then have it just be a happy surprise if I end up not doing it instead of thinking that like, okay, you know, we've, we've always had medical bills, but this is going to be, you know, this is going to be the year that we have no medical bill and no one is sick. But it is easy to kind of think along those lines of like, oh, now we're all healthy and our cars are all running.
So surely there's not gonna be anything that happens this year. But really we do, we do need to have that thought process of just because it happened once doesn't mean it won't happen again. And so, you know, kind of getting, not just what we focused on in this conversation where we grow our capacity to question things and handle it and have that administrative side, but also then ultimately pad the money that we do have to take care of the things that we are responsible for inside of those medical bills.
Lindsey Thomason: Yeah, another last point on this is, is a big one for me and kind of that experience was not like you have your emergency fund and you have it to pay your things, right? Your medical bills, whatever. The things that I hadn't thought about were the added child costs for our other child, right? We were having, we didn't live near any family.
I mean, we did, but they were 45 minutes was the closest. And so, Around the clock, childcare, you're paying somebody for that thousands of extra dollars a week, medical supplies that your child might need when they come home or when they were still hospitalized, like, there's just so many other costs that in, I think, in our minds, we're just like, oh, we have this lump sum set aside for those medical bills, and, you know, obviously we'll fight for them.
We want to pay the least amount, but there's just so many other costs that were shocking to me. Feeding people once family started flying in. I was like, yeah, we have to feed them and, you know, making sure we're sending groceries.
Carly Hill: In the midst of that crisis, your, your prioritization of how you spend your money leans or skews all the way to convenience because it needs to. So it's just like, you know, get all of the takeout by the fastest thing possible, order everything online. We're not going in the store. Like we don't have time to price compare or whatever. And so having the financial ability to afford to just go from, you know, if you used to cook several meals at home or whatever, and just being like, Nope, like for the next month, we are focusing on meal kits or fast food or whatever, having the, the margin to allow yourself to focus on just getting your kid better and, and taking care of all the other stuff as easy as possible is such, it feels like a luxury, but saving cash in advance can afford that luxury.
Well, thank you so much. This is, this is an amazing conversation again. I wish that it was like, Oh, we don't need to talk about this because this never happens, but it happens all the time. So I am happy to get this conversation out in the world for either people who are in the middle of trying to navigate all this that maybe this will give them a boost of confidence to say like, Hey, I actually am going to pick up the phone and talk to insurance or talk to the hospital and make sure that I'm not being you know, taking advantage of might be a strong word, but certainly just having errors passed through me because I wasn't aware.
Lindsey Thomason: Thanks, Carly.
I said it in the episode and I'll say it again. I wish that we didn't have to have these conversations. I wish that what Lindsey experienced was rare instead of common, but unfortunately, this happens too often for people. So I want to put this kind of information and these stories out there so that if and when you experience this in your own family, you're prepared to handle the bills. So, what can we learn from Lindsey? Number one, having an emergency fund helps to secure your finances, even in the face of unexpected medical expenses. Number two, read through everything. Do not assume that the way the bill comes is how it's supposed to be. And number three, keep accurate records. I love how Lindsay used e-mailing herself as her system for always having notes on who she talked to and when and about what.
Next week on the podcast, we'll have Ashley share her story about navigating medical bills as well, and customizing the debt-free mom pay period budget template to help keep track of everything she was paying for.
Thanks for listening to the Debt Free Mom Podcast. If you want to join me as a guest on the show, go to dfmpodcast.com. The Debt Free Mom Podcast is hosted by me, Carly Hill, and is produced, edited, and mixed by Kyle Hill. Music for this episode was written by Kyle Hill. Hit subscribe wherever you're listening to join in with every new episode as we grow our confidence and contentment in our personal finances.
