Levi Bereket or Bereket Nathanael?

This must be the million dollar question. When we returned from Ethiopia, Levi's official name was Bereket Nathanael. There is no choice in this, that's just the way they do it - taking his original name and adding his father's first name as his middle name. (In Ethiopia, children are named after their father's first name. The father's first name becomes the child's last name.) Anyway, we knew we wanted Levi to be named Levi Bereket, and we weren't exactly sure about the process or what to have him under at doctor's offices and insurance. Well, it's turned out to be quite a nightmare. First of all, the whole insurance thing has been quite the ordeal. It's really frustrating because, to me, the process shouldn't be much different than having a baby. Basically, from my limited knowledge and understanding, when you have a baby at the hospital, the hospital automatically sends in the info to the insurance and- voila! - your baby is insured. Well, it's definitely not that easy or hasn't been in our case. We had 30 days from the time we set foot on US soil to submit the papers to insurance. What papers, you ask? Good question. They wanted something that stated that he was "placed" in our home on that particular day. No such paper exists. We have his visa and finally, they got the drift and were able to add him...or so they said, and this was as of only just a couple of weeks ago. (And we have been home how many months and had how many doctor's appointments and submitted the "papers" in their time frame and made how many calls to them??) So, we continue to get bills saying that Levi was not covered at the time of service (from Riley, from peds, from Imaging Center, etc, etc.). Ok...I thought that was straightened out. Apparently not...

We had received a bill from the pediatrician's office a couple of weeks ago which stated that a good portion of the services we had already received were covered; I paid the remaining balance and sent the check in the mail. Hooray!, I thought. We had another doctor's appointment last Friday, and with all the confusion we had, I wanted to check with the billing department while I was there to make sure we were all squared away. To my great dismay and frustration they say, "No, we still have been calling your insurance and they are saying he wasn't insured at the time of service." What?! (Better yet, they refer to Levi as "Burrkit"...)

Umm, what about the bill that seemed to be saying he was covered with the itemized list of services? What about the check I sent? Urgh! So, I talk to three different people and finally, we come to the conclusion that maybe, the problem is with his name. The insurance might have it under Levi Bereket, and the doctor's office documents state his name is Bereket Nathanael. And, oh by the way, they say, we are not allowed to change it without proper documentation. So, could you please call your insurance and see if that might be the problem? Are you kidding?!

What a mess! So, as we try to get this straightened out, we also need to go through the re-adoption process which will officially change Levi's name from Bereket Nathanael to Levi Bereket. So, apparently, the mystery continues...Levi Bereket or Bereket Nathanael? Hopefully we don't have to go through a big ordeal after the readoption occurs. Does it really have to be this difficult??