The letter I'd like to write but won't

Today the phone rang at 9 a.m., and when I picked it up, there was that "click, click--nothing" that you get when telemarketers are cold-calling you. Nothing unusual. Half an hour later, while my kid is sleeping, it happens again, so this time, I *69 it to see who it was. I got a 1-866 number so I called it and found that it was the business offices at University of We Know We Killed Your Kid But You Still Owe Us Money Hospitals and Clinics.

***Sidenote--I actually work for this slaughterhouse, if peripherally: I do public relations for the medical college associated with it. I don't want to be specific since it is my employer...but let's just say it's one of the "biggest teaching hospitals in the country" located in a state that's often confused with the one that grows potatoes.***

Anyway, I don't want to get too in depth here into my experience at U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics because it would just take too damn long, but the crux of the matter is that on JUNE 9, 2003 (this is an important date) when I was pregnant with my daughter and came in bleeding at 21.5 weeks of pregnancy, they did absolutely nothing for me and in fact hastened the premature birth of my daughter, and left part of the placenta in which caused me to hemorrhage and have to have a D&C two weeks later, and told us our daughter was a boy until two weeks after her birth, then continued to harass me with bills for things like a "nursery charge" even though she lived only for nine minutes and never saw the inside of a nursery, or letters asking me and my healthy baby to participate in a study about postpartum depression (somehow they never quite got it that she was dead, okay?) etc., ad infinitum.

After nearly a year of unending bills, at the beginning of 2004, I went personally to the business office of U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics with my checkbook and said, "Tell me everything I owe, because I'm paying it now and I never want to get another bill for this event ever again." I forked over more than a thousand bucks and, silly me, thought I was done with it.

Back to today. Turns out, "Mr. Ricki" on the other end of the phone says, that I still owe U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics $138 for the D&C I had on June 23, 2003. Mind you, the first inkling I had that this was even out there was a bill I received three weeks ago for something I thought was already paid. I asked Mr. Ricki if there was someone to whom I might complain about this bill, and he said they don't have a name they can give me, but instead gave me a P.O. box number to address a dispute letter to.

So....here's the letter I'd like to write.

Dear P.O. Box 530459238:

First, let me thank you for calling me twice and hanging up, forcing me to call you back and wait on hold to find out I owe U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics $138 for the D&C I had almost THREE FUCKING YEARS ago to remove placental tissue that was left in my uterus after your asshole physician staff misdiagnosed my pregnancy complication, did nothing to stop my labor and in fact talked me into taking drugs to hasten it, then told me my daughter was a boy, then told me she was dead when really she lived her only nine minutes of life in the arms of a stranger instead of the arms of her mother where she should have been.

While I'm writing, I'd also like to thank you for the diligent follow-up care I received, from the prenatal classes coordinator who called me the day after I lost my daughter wondering when I was going to pay the fee, to the head of the OB/GYN department who sagely counseled me to "move on," "forget about it," and to seek psychiatric care for my "anger issues" over her staff's incompetence. Oh, yes, I'd also like to give a special shout-out to the U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics medical records department, who took so long to get a copy of my medical records to my lawyer that the medical expert I had hired to SUE YOUR ASS actually DIED FROM NATURAL CAUSES before he could even see them.

I'm so glad I got the opportunity to speak with you today, because due to the recent lack of bills for "nursery charges," the absence of the numerous calls from your postpartum depression research staff wondering how me and my baby were doing, and the fact that nobody from the U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics insurance department has called me recently wondering why I haven't yet had my daughter vaccinated, I had almost managed to bury the deep, murderous rage I feel toward your institution with its shriveled up shells-of-human-beings for doctors, crusty-crotched department heads and automaton nurses.

In fact, I had buried it so deeply that just last week I took my 17-month-old child, yes, my second child, the one I conceived, carried and birthed AFTER the incident for which I am still being billed, to the U of WKWKYKBYSOUM Hospitals and Clinics orthopedics department for a consultation last week. I was even planning to avail myself of other services at your institution until I heard from you today, reminding me to NEVER SET FOOT IN YOUR FUCKING SHITTY-ASS, RUNDOWN "HOSPITAL" again.

Back to the business at hand, I just have a few questions for you about this bill. Is there any sort of statute of limitations for how long you may continue to bill me for this event in my life? Just so I can be prepared, is there a possibility that when I'm 78 and 25 years out from my hysterectomy that I might still be receiving bills from my D&C in June 2003? Would it be advisable for me to set up a trust fund in my will in case a bill surfaces sometime around the turn of the next century? Will my heirs be responsible for continuing to "settle" this debt every three years or so until the end of time?

I hope you will be able to answer my questions in a letter, although I'm not quite sure how a P.O. Box writes letters, or for that matter, handles "disputes." All I can say is that it's going to suck to be you, Mr. or Mrs. P.O. Box 530459238, because I suppose to a P.O. Box, this letter will be a hard ass-fucking that will TEAR YOU UP, motherfucker.

Now go on and try to squeeze the next dime out of somebody else who isn't as smart or as angry or as able or as healthy as I am, because my fist is closed tight and ready to do business.

Sincerely,
Depressionista