New & Improved?

Lately, my mom & my husband have been commenting about how motherhood has changed me. The old me had a tendency to be a bit on the anal retentive side. Slightly inflexible and one might even say high strung. Since Jackson's arrival, my perspective has changed. Things that used to matter a whole lot to me now seem rather inconsequential. Situations that once would have sent me into a total tail spin, such as this one, just don't seem to be quite as big of a deal. I've relaxed (a little). And now I'm being tested!

In the past 10 days the following has happened:

1. Rear ended in our new car

2. Discovered fraudulent activity in our checking account - more on this later

3. Learned that because Jackson arrived in 2008 instead of 2009, all of the claims we have submitted to our Section 125 Plan (aka: flexible spending account) for out of pocket medical expenses are being declined.

The old me would have been hyperventilating at the mere thought of 1 of those things, let alone all 3. But not the new & improved me.

1. You already know that I took the car accident in stride. After all, no one was hurt.

2. The bank fraud has been a little harder to swallow. Somehow, my debit card number was compromised. The card has never been out of my possession so it was obtained by some computer hacker somewhere. They managed to make 26 transactions in 1 day; however, we were extremely fortunate. The bank detected the fraudulent activity and notified us immediately. The card was cancelled and the charges totaled less than $150 - which will be returned to us by the bank. It wasn't until last night that I started to revert to the old me. We received in the mail 3 packages - all from merchants that this scammer made purchases from. So in addition to our card number, they have our address. Creepy. The products are all from vitamin/weight loss companies. We have since figured out that the scam involves signing up for "free trial offers" using stolen credit card information. You get a bottle of said vitamin/weight loss product for only the cost of shipping. The transactions are for a small enough amount that the victims often don't notice these postings on their account - $4.95 here, $1.99 there. The kicker comes a month later when the free trial offer is over and you are then automatically charged the full monthly fee...for a service you had no idea you signed up for. Evil isn't it. We think we're protected since the compromised card no longer exists, but to be sure we are now filing a police report and speaking regularly to the bank's fraud department. Serious pain in the you know what and tons of paperwork.

3. Nothing earth shattering here, but it does mean all of our out of pocket expenses from Jackson's birth will now truly be out of pocket! And we have $2,000 in a flexible spending account that must be used on medical expenses by the end of the year or we will lose it. The bright side...baring a true medical emergency that requires use of those funds, I see some seriously designer eye glasses, and maybe sunglasses too, in Drew & my future!

See. Not kidding when I said I was being tested.

So far, I think I've passed the test. No stomach issues. No anxiety attacks.

Like I said, my perspective has changed. My focus has shifted to what's really important. And all of a sudden an unscratched car, a bunch of fraud paperwork and a few hospital bills don't fit in that category. I get to come home to this every night:

And that's all that really matters.

Maybe Mom & Drew are right. It's a New & Improved me.