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Well, fuck me sideways.
I came into work this morning thinking I would have great news to share here: I found a therapist! I actually booked an appointment! I used the Mindful Therapy Group website, submitted an inquiry using very easy to use filters, and got a call back from a live person in the afternoon who helped me find someone. She not only found an appointment at 11 a.m. Monday, but in a place all of two buildings north of my office! How awesome is that?
Well, too good to be true, it kind of turns out. I'm so glad I thought about this this morning: this woman takes Aetna insurance, but is she in-network? I called Mindful Therapy Group back and had to leave a message, asking for clarification on that. I also called Aetna back to have an agent look up the name of the woman I set up an appointment with: she's out-of-network. According to Aetna overview, the mental health coverage out of network is only 60%. And if there's even a chance I could get full coverage outside a copay (and, presumably, the deductible), then I need to go for that.
What a pain in the ass. How the hell does anyone actually experiencing a mental health crisis deal with this shit?
There's no hurry, I guess. My primary concern is that this happens, but I'm not overly concerned about how quickly it can. And I remain on the waiting list of that other woman in the Central District who I know is in-network. I'm sure glad I didn't jump the gun and email her to remove me from the list. I had just been pretty thrilled that I could book someone so soon, and so shockingly close by, through Mindful Therapy Group. Fuck, I wish I had mentioned it needing to be in-network when I was on the phone yesterday. I don't know if they can even filter that way from their end, but it would be nice. I did find two other people from Mindful Therapy Group who offer couples counseling
and appear to be listed in-network on the Aetna website. They just aren't as close by, or we might have to go with telehealth appointments. Whatever we can make work, I guess. Neither of those other people have "LGBTQ+" as one of their areas of specialty, but I suppose that's not a deal breaker.
3:13 EDIT: This just in!
I got the call back from Mindful Therapy Group, and for a few minutes there was confusion, as I was told I needed to be transferred to their billing department for clarification—according to their records, the woman I had already booked with
is in-network. I was disinclined to take their word over that of an agent from Aetna, but then again, Aetna is so huge it's not outside the realm of possibility that that person was mistaken.
In the end, I did get clarification from MTG: this woman bills through a supervisor, who
is in-network. I was already logged in on the Aetna website, so I was able to find that person's name, and even their "NPI number" which is a 10-digit code used for billing. Both came up as in-network and "accepting new patients," so there you have it, I guess. I just need to finish filling out some online paperwork and evidently we're good to go.
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— पांच हजार सात सौ तिहत्तर —
Not much else to report, except that Shobhit and I went out for dessert last night. Another Social Review point!
We even went before dinner. "Live is short, have dessert first," as they say. Shobhit wanted to go buy his lottery ticket, and mentioned while we were walking that Salt & Straw has new flavors this month. We went to QFC first, and then walked the couple of blocks over to Salt & Straw. Shobhit got a split flavor single scoop, half
Conrflake Cookies with Marionberry Jam and half
Pumpkin Spiced Tiramisu, a leftover flavor. I had a single scoop up of
Peanut Butter Brownie Cereal Puffs, which was fucking amazing.
We found several small bags of discounted "imperfect produce" items at QFC, so we also had a paper bag of groceries. It was awkward to carry and also eat our ice cream, so I suggested we eat there. This made it more legitimately "going out for dessert," anyway. Less of a cheat for the Social Review. Not that Shobhit has anything to worry about there, as I have already demonstrated.
We walked home and had tacos for dinner, using leftovers from the nachos made the previous night for Action Movie Night as the filling. They were very tasty. We ate while finishing up season two of
Silo, which I really liked a lot—we had two episodes of that to get through—and then watching this week's episode of
Severance, which was very weird. It's super weird every week, but this one was very different and weird in its own way.
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[posted 12:32pm]
