Fax Sign Word Myself

To send a test fax to yourself with airSlate SignNow, simply log into your account and navigate to the faxing option. From there, you can enter your own fax number and upload a document to test the functionality. This allows you to ensure everything works smoothly before sending important documents.

Sending a test fax to yourself through airSlate SignNow typically does not incur additional costs. However, standard faxing rates may apply depending on your subscription plan. Be sure to review your plan specifics to understand any potential charges that may arise.

Using airSlate SignNow to send a test fax to yourself provides a seamless way to verify the faxing process. It ensures that your documents are formatted correctly and that the service meets your expectations. Additionally, the user-friendly interface helps simplify the entire process.

Yes, you can easily send a test fax to yourself from your mobile device using the airSlate SignNow app. The mobile platform is designed to be intuitive, allowing you to upload documents and send faxes on the go. This ensures that you have access to faxing capabilities anytime, anywhere.

You can send a variety of document types as a test fax to yourself, including PDFs, Word documents, and images. airSlate SignNow supports multiple file formats to accommodate your needs. This flexibility allows you to ensure that every type of document you need can be sent without issues.

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When sending a test fax to yourself, look for features such as document tracking, delivery confirmation, and the ability to edit documents before sending. airSlate SignNow offers these features to ensure your faxing needs are met efficiently. These functionalities can help you maintain organization and keep your communications effective.

I was accepted to Stanford on a full scholarship as a transfer student from a California Community College at the age of 28. My husband was very sick at the time and couldn't work, so we made do on food stamps and AFDC. I worked as much as I could (under the table) to keep a roof over our heads and pay for his medical bills, going so far as to take a nannying job 3–4 nights a week, caring for the 3 year old son of a single father who was also the graveyard shift on-call oncologist at the medical center. He paid fairly well, but we were always one small disaster away from homelessness.i managed to get pregnant at the beginning of my last year, a co-term year during which I earned my master’s degree. You haven't lived until you've spent nine months working towards a post-graduate degree at Stanford, growing more and more pregnant by the day, juggling four jobs in two counties, wrangling with a social worker who keeps telling you to quit school and find a job making $10/hr as a fry cook, commuting 2–3 hours every day from Santa Cruz to Palo Alto and back over a tsignNowerous mountain road with NO PUBLIC RESTROOMS AT ALL to care for a husband who could not walk, needed to be rushed to the emergency room at least three or four times a month and whose doctors gave him only a 50/50 chance of living to see the birth of our first and only child.I would listen to my classmates talk about their family villas on Majorca, using “summer” as a verb, while calculating in my head if I could find enough change in my sofa to buy a bag of dry beans so we could eat for another week until the next month’s food stamps came in. They would discuss their plans to kayak some fjord in Iceland over spring break while I looked forward to working triple shifts and standing in line at the grocery store, getting dirty looks from disgusted customers who didn't like being held up by the clearly lazy and irresponsible welfare queen who was using a WIC voucher to pay for a carton of milk, a can of tuna and a tube of frozen orange juice concentrate. They asked me to come along in their BMWs to go wine tasting in Napa for the weekend while I wondered if I had enough bus money to get back to Santa Cruz to sign papers and advocate for my incoherent husband, who was in the hospital again and in danger of receiving treatment from one of his six specialists that could render useless or even combine lethally with the treatment prescribed by another, because they didn't bother to communicate with each other. And all the while, of course, thinking “okay, I can't afford maternity clothes, so I'm wearing one of my husband’s old workshirts every day, but can you not clearly see I'm as pregnant as fucking octomom?? I can't remember the last time I even had a cup of full-caff coffee, let alone a glass of wine! DUH!”When I got too big to ride my bike around campus, I would take the shuttle to my classes, where too often I would end up standing for the whole ride, because the seats were all full of students too consumed by their phones to notice the whale of a person standing in front of them trying to stabilize her center of gravity because of the 8 pound baby in her uterus and the 30 pound bag of books on her back. I had to battle the urge to challenge all of them to a fist fight for their obliviousness.Toward the end of that year, as I waddled toward the finish line, I found myself almost delirious from chronic sleep-deprivation. The one thing that kept me going was the miraculous fact that my baby was not due until a couple of weeks after graduation. Somehow I became fixated on the idea that I would get to go see a movie, for fun, between the time I graduated and the time I became a mother. It was all I thought about, honestly, as I trudged from one obligation to the next. I would be sitting in the dark, by myself, in a chair that probably was too small for my now-grotesque body, out of which I would have to heave myself every 15 minutes to use the bathroom, but damn was I ever looking forward to it! Two whole hours to myself, with no more bitchy egotistical TAs to contend with, no more deadlines, no more cramming for finals, no more arriving home after a fourteen hour day with feet so swollen and painful that it took me ten minutes to ratchet up the nerve to pry them out of my shoes. Maybe I would even fall asleep over my unbuttered, unsalted popcorn for half an hour!it was with this decadent fantasy in mind that I sat to write my last essay. It was, as I recall, an analysis of William Faulkner’s “Absalom! Absalom!” Twenty minutes in, I began to feel a little funny. I tried to write it off as indigestion, but by the time I was halfway though with the paper, i could deny it no longer. I was in labor.i finished my essay, breathing through the contractions, pushed “print”, sighed a little sadly, packed a bag and drove myself to the hospital, where I gave birth, with no drugs (except a well-deserved shot of Wild Turkey when it was all over), even when the baby went into cardiac distress and they had to rip me a new vagina in their haste to get her out, not even when they put in 36 stitches afterward to sew me back together. When they whisked her away to work on her, and I was alone again, I pulled that last essay from my bag, walked myself down to the nurse’s station, stitches and all, and faxed it to my professor with a note of apology, hoping he would understand why I couldn't be at our planned meeting that morning.I graduated five days later, with high honors. I still have the picture: my diploma in one hand and my baby in the other: My Week in Review.It was hands-down the most stressful year of my life, including the time of my husband’s actual death, which came not too many years later.When I look back on that time, my heart nearly bursts with gratitude, for my incredible husband, who suffered grievously but tried to hide it for my sake, and who was overjoyed in spite of his suffering about the birth of our daughter. I am grateful for his nurses and orderlies, who went the extra mile to care for him when i couldn't be there. I am grateful for my understanding, compassionate professors, who reassured me that everything would be okay and who let me get up in the middle of class whenever I wanted to relieve the pressure on my tailbone. I am grateful for my social worker, whose sternness and admonishments could never hide the fact that she was rooting for us to make it. I am grateful to the government for the $92 a month that allowed us to eat when I could no longer work. I am grateful beyond words for the forces that gave me the opportunity to study with the world’s most renowned minds, to earn a degree in a field that I'm wildly passionate about, at a school that any student would be proud to attend, that gave me the will to carry and deliver a healthy baby and that gave her father the strength to live long enough to receive her into his arms and to shower on her all the love that he could muster, and all his hope for a bright future, in spite of his suffering and the knowledge of his coming death.Now, 17 years later, I'm a tenured college English teacher myself. I never did get to see that movie… but whenever I think back on that time, overwhelmingly and unmitigatedly, what I feel is gratitude.That is what it's like to be a broke Stanford student.Edit: So many thanks for all the encouraging comments. To clarify: I don’t consider myself all that extraordinary. I think most people are stronger and more resilient than they think they are, and this year proved that to me, without a doubt. I didn’t do it alone, however. I had many resources that others do not have, and I never felt for a second that the universe was being unfair to me or my family. Everyday, I see people who manage to spread joy and compassion in the face of what seems like unendurable hardship. My own students inspire me all the time, as I see them struggle through poverty, sickness, homelessness, abusive situations, substance abuse, and countless other stresses.If I could manifest one change as a result of this experience, it would be to free people from their own judgmental reactions when they encounter welfare recipients during their daily adventures. Yes, it’s true that there are some folks who take undue advantage of the safety net that this great country provides (as modest as it may be) but it has been my experience that the vast majority are doing the best they can with what they have, and take their first opportunity to leave government aid behind and join the ranks of contributing taxpayers. I was stunned by the number of nasty comments I got from people as I tried to pay for my meager cart of groceries with food stamps or WIC. Yes, I was pregnant. Yes, for all intents and purposes, I was a single parent. Yes, I was attending one of the most elite and expensive schools in the world . That was only part of the story, though. I wish more people would be mindful of the fact that facing such judgement is humiliating, exhausting and discouraging when one is just trying to get through the day, especially on top of all the other challenges that made it necessary to apply for aid to begin with. I can easily see those comments being the thing that at the end irrevocably breaks the spirit of a person who is trying harder than most people can ever imagine, for longer than seems humanly possible.Once in a while I would receive a word of encouragement or a smile. I remember every one of those moments from compassionate strangers . I stored up their supportive words as defense against the days when it seemed all too easy to just give up. I make it a point now to do the same when I see someone who looks like they might be struggling. I always want to say, hang in there. Things actually do get better if you just keep putting one foot in front of the other. Don’t give up, in spite of all the mean spiritedness that might come your way. There are more people out there who are kind and understanding, and who are on your side, even if they don’t say it out loud.

It’s not the police, but it was the army. I had been in for 4 years and had signed off, a few months from civvie street.I was called into the discipline sgt’s room whom then left and 2 different individuals walked in. A male and a female.Edit: Hi Jojo DaCosta.They were RMP- Royal Military Police and I was in the brown sticky stuff.They proceeded to obtain my car keys and searched my room and car. They found a quantity of amphetamine.At this point, I had been left for 7 hours. I expressed surprise in my interview and gave a plausible reason of why it might have been there with no repercussion on myself or anyone else. I did ask where the tip came from, so I could give my opinion on where the drugs had then came from. They refused to comply. The conversation went on for a while. I repeated I didn’t know why it was there and the fact it was found on the passenger side was important. After the conversation concluded and the tape stopped, they told me they didn’t want to charge me for possession, but for intent to supply. The civvie lawyer appointed to me was useless ‘just tell them, what they want to hear’.The ‘street value’ was £20.There was 3 months of hell, being stuck at the regiment. I was told by the Officer Commanding of HQ Sqn that no one had ever got away from being charged for drugs by the regiment. I was due to leave, but my resignation was stopped.There was such an aggressive stance from the army, who were convinced I was a drug dealer and was part of an organised crime group operating down south. They were bloody clueless.Strangely, I was treated with a lot more of respect by the lads. I was seen as a player. I didn’t bend over for the Officers and when I got a bollocking about ‘being a druggie’, I asked them to ‘prove it’. If anyone did give me to much hassle, I slipped into conversation that my friends were coming up to see me this weekend. With the idiots believing I was a Yardie, that normally shut them up.Anyway, Army Legal and the Regiment were arguing. Army Legal were trying to get the unit to charge me for possession due to less evidence needed and less work all round and little probability for conviction of anything more serious, whilst the Regiment pushed back to court martial me for intent to supply, saying they would break me and make me ’confess’ even if I was innocent or not and wanting a ‘life changing’ sentence. It’s important here to highlight that the army would rather get their way and be seen to be in control, rather than be seen to be fair or in the right. Their is no reflective practice in the majority of their view, just rigid discipline.I got a brief and Army Legal bottled it before Court Martial. I got dragged into the Discipline Sgts office and I was told I was going to confess or he would get angry. I told him to f off.I also got pulled in front of the Quartermaster’s Staff Sgt and he told me he was going to court martial me, rescind my leave and make me stay in the regiment for the remainder of 22 years. The guy was responsible for supplies, accommodation, equipment and reported into many people below the Commanding Officer. I sniggered in his face, I just couldn’t hide the fact that he thought a Staff Sgt could rewrite army policy. Bad move, he was screaming at me, spitting on my face. I wasn’t smiling or talking, but I wouldn’t break eye contact with him. I wanted a fight. It was very intense. He told me to get out of his sight, he had his boys with him and I slowly walked away. I was angry, but I was already in trouble, without swinging against an SNCO with witnesses. He didn’t look back at me.I eventually took a drug test. I waited for the results over the next few days and had a knock on the door in the evening. The Guard Corporal was at my door and he told me that the results had come back and I tested positive. I knew this was impossible.I was told, if I didn’t confess, I would get 6 months inside, probably more as they could prove I was lying about taking drugs and this would prove I was lying about supplying the drugs. I could confess and cut a deal. I said no. In retrospect, they had discovered I was clean, but wanted me to confess out of panic, so they could charge me without having any other evidence. This was all just to save face…2 days passed, I was told but he OC of HQ Sqn that my resignation would be carried out, but they were letting me off ‘as I was a friend to the Regiment’. I reminded him, that next time, he needed to say that if anyone else was charged, then he would tell them ‘everyone who is charged for Drugs gets convicted…well apart from XXXXX’. The majority of the regiment were due back from exercise and they wanted me out before they arrived.I went to sign out the Regiment and turned up to the Staff Sgts office. He had been warned I was on my way from the Chief Clerk. He hid in his office whilst I called him a coward to his boys. I made the point, I didn’t want him to hide behind the fact that a fight would cost him his career and I would be at the local pub at a specific time and if he had any bottle he would see me there, no repercussions, no reporting it to the police or the RMPs.Needless to say, he rather took the hit to his pride than enter a fair fight. I had a pint of Smiths. I am glad I didn’t serve with him in a war zone due to his cowardice. I am sure he feels the same, as he presumably believes in ’no smoke without fire’. However, I know what I saw and he’s a talker if he’s backed up by his own boys and the other guy is in a serious disadvantage, not so much in a fair fight. In a one on fight, with my TKD and boxing experience, I am certain I would have creamed him. He knew I was in the boxing squad and there was no way he was going to head to head with me.I also did a doughnut in my car outside Regimental Headquarters whilst blasting out ‘I want to be a hippie and I want to get stoned’ by Technohead on my car radio’.Once I left, the Colonel apparently announced to the Regiment I had been found guilty and I was in jail, sentenced to 5 years. In reality I had an Honourable Discharge and a certificate stating I left the Army, as Discharge as of Right (i.e. I had decided to leave).Imagine their surprise, when I bumped into a few of the regiment a year later when I was re-mobolised in Iraq. I had a very excited Corporal asking me what I was doing in a war zone given I had been sent to MCTC. I asked him to believe either the Colonel wasn’t a liar or his eyes and ears were deceiving him. I liked that, the guy wasn’t to smart, but he had a mouth on him. Sooner or later word would get back through the Regiment. I was untouchable as I was attached to another unit, but I watched my steps for the last couple of months. I put nothing past that Regiment.I got £7,000 compensation. I was naive, I could have got a lot more.But, realising that ’elite, academically gifted’ officers who went to Eton and Harrow were as thick as pig-sh!t? Priceless.EDIT -Thanks for the comments. I am fairly new to Quora, so have just seen them.I am currently a civil servant/accountant. I stood up to the army, as I didn’t want to spend 5 years in prison and have a criminal record. Before this time, I worked hard, was a bit naive and thought if you kept your head down and worked, then that was the way forward. Because they mistakenly thought I was timid, I believe this enraged them more that I could out-think them and push back myself. Looking back, I was quiet, not particularly extraverted, which is why the Army thought they could get away with it. I am now aware enough that if people could identify this with me, then I would have all sorts of rumours about me. To this day, I get the odd facebook message asking me ‘’what really happened back then?’’ Both accountancy and the civil service are by nature risk averse.Regarding the Officers, yeah, it was a Cavalry unit. I’ve met some good Officers in other units (heck I have a couple of them in linked in), but Cavalry are a different breed. The NCO’s at Staffy and below didn’t really know what was going on and were trying to bully me. The WO’s were relatively fair - Chief Clerk and RSM in particular acted non judgemental. I wouldn’t expect them to stand up for me in that position.The Guard NCO didn’t know me. He was put in a hell of a position. I guess the fax went to the Discipline Sgt and he discussed it with the Adjutant and they leaned on the Corporal to come at me from a different route. The Adjutant pretty much ran the Regiment.

Let me say this first ... my brother passed away two years ago, (less than a month after his wife and my once best friend, died) so he's not here to defend himself ... or give his version of what he did to me.  I mention this only because I don't believe he thought himself abusive.I grew up in a chaotic and nightmarish household.  My Mom was a beautiful looking, manipulative monster ... who hurt countless people.  She was so full of herself, that she refused to believe me when I told her "uncle" Steve (one of her lovers), had molested me.  Which is why after that first incident, he felt free to molest me throughout my childhood.While Mom forced her will on my entire family, I had always assumed she treated my brother (her favorite) well. As a child I didn't know she was mentally ill and had passed on the same illness to my brother.  Just before Mom's death, I learned my Brother had also been horribly abused by her. Upon learning that fact, I became suicidally depressed.The one absolute I'd always thought I'd had ... was the belief that my Brother was the ONLY one in my family who was OK.  After he left our home (the moment he was legally old enough to leave), my Mom's abusive behaviour towards me escalated.  Throughout the difficult years after he left ... I took solace in the belief that my Brother had been spared the worst of my Mom's behaviour.  While I was sad that he'd chosen to push me away, I was happy that he'd escaped to a better life ... with wonderful and supportive friends, and a family of his own.  My hope was that he and I would eventually reconnect when I was an adult ... and had a life of my own.This story is difficult to write, as I'm only now coming to terms with the fact my brother hurt me on a regular basis.  This is the first time I've written in any detail the events which transpired. This is the first time I'm acknowledging that the brother I thought I had ... never really existed.  The pain of this statement is almost too much to bear.I pray that in death, my Brother finally found the peace and love he spent his life searching for. The photo below is of my Brother and his beloved wife Angie.  It was taken after she was diagnosed with Cancer ... about a year before they both died.May God forgive me for writing this. The fact is, my brother's actions placed me in grave danger numerous times.  I was raped, beaten, and left for dead, by my Mom's lover (our gardener) ... after my brother left me home alone to go across the street to play basketball with his friends.The fact is my brother never stood up for me and allowed his friends to put me down, insult, and make fun of me.  Friends who insulted me for being fat ... or young ... or looking odd (I'm a redhead with pale white skin).The fact is my brother never did anything to protect me and always walked away when bad things were happening.  At age 9, (I was barely two) he stood by and watched while a group of his friends took off my diaper and filled my vagina with tiny twigs. He said nothing when my Grandmother called me a filthy whore and then spanked me for doing nasty things to myself.The fact is my brother seemed to enjoy bullying me.  The fact is ... the one and ONLY time I ever called him and asked for help, he shut me completely out of his life for close to 15 years (basically almost until he died).  I'll never know what I did to make him dislike me, what his intended outcome was, or what made him have a desire to hurt and/or abandon me so many times over the years.  I only know I have to fight to feel good about myself.  On bad days I feel worthless, stupid and unloved.---------------------------------------------------------100 Baby Aspirin with a side of Ipecac The first time my brother almost killed me was in 1959, when I was 3 years old and he was 11.  The passport photo below was taken around the time of this incident.  It was summer and we had driven into Los Angeles to have it taken.  It had been incredibly hot that day.  After standing in line for hours, we were all miserable and tired.When I was little I had a habit of climbing up into the kitchen sink to get a drink of water.  My Mom didn't like to be bothered, and insisted we use the same cup for a day ... so she wouldn't be forced to wash more dishes.This morning I was sitting with my feet in the sink, drinking some water and my brother asked me if I wanted some baby aspirin.  "You know you like it."  He said, pointing to a bottle on the kitchen windowsill ... smiling. "It tastes like orange candy."I signNowed out to touch the bottle and he made a big face.  I started giggling.  He was rubbing his stomach and making smacking sounds, which made me giggle more.  So I grabbed the bottle and hugged it to my chest.When I opened it we both broke out laughing."HUMMM!" said my brother with a glint in his eye.  So I put one in my mouth and started chewing.  My brother stepped back and leaned against the kitchen counter, smiling.Now silent he was staring at me intently, as I put one pill after another into my mouth.  He didn't say a word as I slowly ingested most of a bottle (close to a hundred pills).  My stomach started feeling bad, so I stopped eating.I watched my brother slowly walk towards our Mom's bedroom.  He stopped for an instant and smiled at me.  I remember smiling back.  Suddenly he called out to my Mom.  Yelling, "Mom, Jeanne just ate all the Baby Aspirin."  I was terrified.  My Mom ran into the kitchen in near hysterics.  She picked up the nearly empty bottle of Baby Aspirin and began screaming at me.  At nearly six feet tall, my Mom was an imposing figure.Mom yanked me up from the kitchen sink by one arm, and began beating my bottom liberally with her free hand.  She literally dragged me to the master bathroom.  I was crying when she stood me up in front of the toilet. Terrified when she lifted up the lid and seat.  When she placed her long slender finger down my throat and forced me to vomit, I flew into hysterics.  Holding me roughly against her, she repeatedly shoved her beautifully manicured finger inside my mouth, bruising and cutting the inside of my throat until blood began intermingling with my vomit.My brother was watching silently from the distance with a strange and disturbing look in his eyes.  He watched as I vomited after Mom stuck her finger down my throat ... watched as my Mom forced me to gussle mouthfulls of ipecac ... continued watching as the  ipecac caused me to vomit uncontrollably ... watched as I lay writhing in pain on the bathroom floor covered in my own excrement and vomit.When I began convulsing, my Mom took me to my pediatrician, who berated her for having given me too much ipecac.  The pediatrician hugged me and comforted me.  She gave me a big glass of salty tasting water.  She told me to drink some activated charcoal.  The glass of black fluid terrified me, almost as much as the look on my brother's face.I returned home bruised, sore and still shaking.  I remember my heart was racing inside my chest and my ears were ringing like a bell.  I felt abandoned and disconnected from everything, both hot and cold, dizzy, tired, and frightened half out of my three-year-old mind.Did my brother try to hurt me that day?  There's a part of me which still believes "I" caused this.  He didn't force me to do anything ... all he did was talk and make suggestions.  I was three and a half years old, I trusted and adored my big brother ... and loved him more than anyone else on the planet.---------------------------------------------------------Batter UP!The second time my Brother almost killed me was in 1961, when I was five and he was 13.My brother and his friends were playing baseball in our front yard.  I loved playing baseball and pestered my Mom into letting me play with my Brother.  My Mom called my brother "Dicky" (her pet name for him) in front of his friends.  They laughed at him when she told him to let me play along.He told me I couldn't hit the ball ... that I was the catcher.  I was good at grabbing the ball.  I also loved listening to my Brother and his friends talk shit with one and other.  So I was happy to be in the game.  I was going to be EVERYONE's catcher.When my Brother took his turn at bat I didn't think anything was wrong.  His friends had been heckling him about his baby sister and the fact that my Mom still called him "Dicky", which he hated.  In retrospect I suppose he was angry and upset.  But I was five and only knew I was playing baseball with the big boys.My Brother missed the first pitch, and I grabbed the ball.  "I got it Dicky, I got the ball!  His friends roared with laughter.  I assumed my Brother's friends were laughing at me, but I didn't mind.  I was gloriously, blissfully happy to be part of the group.My brother hit the second pitch into the far end of neighbor's front yard ... an automatic home run.  I was jumping up and down when my Brother threw the bat behind his back.  (Something I'd NEVER seen him do before)  One minute I was standing behind my brother, the next moment I heard a loud crack as his bat slammed down hard onto the top of my head.My vision was filled with exploding stars and then went completely white.  I remember walking around in circles behind my Mom's car ... too stunned to feel pain, let alone cry. The world went sort of silent ... I remember hearing what sounded like the roar of the ocean echoing inside my head.  The first thing I remember hearing was the sound of my Brother and his friends laughing.My ears still ringing, I stumbled into the house looking for my Mom.  "Mama, Mama, Dicky hit me with a bat."My Mom looked at me and shook her head.  "Dicky would never hurt you, he's your big brother and he loves you.  Besides you look fine."Crying now, and wanting to be comforted, I signNowed out to my Mom.  "Stop acting like a baby."  she said, dismissively.  She pushed past me and walked out to speak with my Brother.  "Dicky!" She half shouted to my brother.  His friends roared with laughter.  My brother ignored my Mom and continued roughhousing with his friends."Dicky!"  She shouted tersely.  "I'm calling you."  When he didn't answer she called to him again.  "Deee-key!"  My brother groaned."Maaa" whined my Brother.  "I told you not to call me that."  More laughter from his friends."Dicky, what happened with Jeannika?""Nothing Mom." Said my brother. "She accidentally ran into the bat.  It hardly touched her."Naturally my Mom believed my Brother.  For weeks afterwards I became dizzy getting in and out of bed.  The bump on my head never went away.---------------------------------------------------------Tickling at the MoviesWe used to go to drive-in Movies.  Mom liked the fact that she could bring her own popcorn and soda.  She loved the fact that she could take me in my pajamas, because I always fell asleep watching movies (still do).  Something I had in common with my Dad, who also fell asleep at concerts and in church.  We had an old white 1950 Studebaker station wagon.  Mom would push down the back seat ... and then cover the inside with sleeping bags, blankets and pillows.  My Dad parked the car and put in the speaker.When the screen came alive, we knew the movie was about to start.  If Dad had extra money he and my Brother would go to the concession stand and buy treats.  If I were really lucky I'd get frozen Bon Bons.When we first arrived at the drive-in, before the movie started, my brother would pin me down and start tickling the bottom of my feet.  I'd laugh uncontrollably, scream at him to stop ... while kicking and fighting to get away.  He keep on tickling until I started crying, wet my pants, or had to vomit.  Once I began crying, everyone in the car called me a baby.  If I wet my pants I was punished.  If I threw up I was in even more trouble.My Brother kept tickling me until I was almost 9 years old (he was 16) and learned NOT to react until he became too bored to continue tormenting me.My parents thought my Brother's behaviour was endearing, and a sign of how much he loved and cared for me.  They always smiled when he tickled me.  I HATED being tickled so mercilessly and hated being pinned down.  I never understood why no one ever stopped to help me.  I could never explain how violated and ashamed I felt afterward.---------------------------------------------------------Around 1984 my Brother began talking about moving away from California.  He wasn't happy with his current job.  I recommended him to the owners of the computer company I worked for.After having interviewed my Brother, my boss said he had requested a lot of money.  I quickly stated my Brother would be well worth it ... as he was smarter than me ... and better at EVERYTHING.Up until that time, my boss had given me frequent raises and bonuses.  He said if he hired my Brother I had to agree to no pay raises for two years.  I agreed without hesitation.Technically I had seniority over my Brother.  I was office manager, and also did sales and some technical support.  I had my own office, my own business cards, and my own clients.  I loved my Job and the people I worked with.At break time, I'd always go outside for a walk.  Some days I'd pick up a breakfast quesadilla with a side of red salsa ... always remembering to get an order for my Brother.A few months after he started, my brother was acting as if he was running the whole show.  He recommended a new salesman to the boss, stating he could help increase sales.  The boss agreed it was a good idea.  The guy had supposedly been an olympic class skier and drove a fancy expensive yellow sports car.  Everyone liked him ... all the guys loved his car.He and my Brother became instant friends.  They went on lunch breaks together and visited one and other's homes.  Every morning my brother came in to work he brought a fresh donut and coffee for the new guy.  Every Monday I'd listen to them talking about what they'ed done during the weekend.For years I'd been asking my Brother when I could visit him at his home.  For years I was told he and Angie were too busy to have company.  Angie, had once been my best friend ... but was out of my life almost the moment she and my Brother hooked up.  After they married, I saw them occasionally on holidays.Never one to wait for invitations, my Dad simply drove to my Brother's home when he was in the area.  He and Angie became fast friends ... they both had the same wacky sense of humor.  I envied my Father's ability to transcend convention and simply be.  Afraid of facing total rejection I waited for an invitation to my Brother's home.  Sadly, it never came.I don't know if the new guy realized I was Dick's sister ... but one day he started making fat jokes whenever I walked into the sales office.  I after having told a particularly insulting fat joke ... I remember him pointing at me and laughing out loud, while wacking my brother on the back ... who was laughing as well.Photo of me taken around the time of this incident.I remember numerous occasions when I was so overwhelmed that I went into my office, closed the door and began crying.My Dad was dying at the time.  He'd had a massive heart attack about three months prior and had just been diagnosed with malignant kidney cancer.  He was scheduled to have both kidneys and his bladder removed.  He and I had an unspoken agreement to not talk about the cancer.  We spent a lot of time together and tried to make the most of a bad situation.Dad came to the office often ... hoping to score quality time with my Brother ... who always begged off ... stating he was too busy to go to lunch.  So Dad spent time with me.  The thing is, I was living with my parents at the time.  (1) I helped take care of my Mom who had had a stroke a year earlier, (2) I also helped manage my father's meds, along with preparing meals, getting groceries and keeping up the house.  So I knew my Brother was my Dad's primary reason for visiting.Once my Dad found me in my office crying about a bunch of jokes I'd heard that morning.  Dad and hugged me and told me he'd talk to my brother for me.  He said he was sure my brother didn't mean to make you cry.  I knew he did ... as he'd been doing so for more years than I cared to remember.  I hugged my Dad and told him to forget about it.Around this time my Car died.  I told my Mom I was taking the bus to work.  That evening she informed me my Brother would be taking me to work ... that he would pick me up on his way in.  I told her he took the freeway in and didn't come anywhere near our house.The next morning my Brother showed up groggy eyed, puffing on a cigarette.  "Hi Mom"  He half growled in a deep early morning voice, while enduring a hug.  "Gotta go, Mom."  He looked at me and rolled his big blue eyes ... still puffy with sleep, and grabbed my arm.  "Come on!"  He looked back at our Mom and waved.  "Gotta run."My Brother had two speeds while driving ... FAST or STOP.  Peddle to the metal ... as they say.  He was either speeding up ... going full throttle ... or slamming on the brakes.  His driving scared the living crap out of me.I know you think I'm exaggerating.  Trust me, I'm NOT!  I owned a bronze colored Satellite Sebring Plus with a special fuel injected 442 racing engine which could signNow speeds around 200mph.  Not that I drove it that fast.  Although I did drive to Oakland one night on a dare ... going 160 the entire time.  Did I get there fast.  Boy I LOVED that car.My Brother shared my car with me for a year.  He drove the plymouth at night and I used it during the day.  I remember one memorable morning when he dropped the car off so I could drive to work. "Hey kid, did you know your speedometer sticks at around 140?"  I just looked at him.  "The God damned cop said I was going 177.  When I questioned that number he showed me the number on his radar gun.  You might wanna have the speedometer calibrated."My Brother systematically wrecked my engine, wore out my tires and brakes, damaged the ball joints and cracked the universal joint.  (He wrecked EVERY car he ever owned)  Which were all reasons my car was in bad shape and I was riding with him to work.  I didn't have the five grand needed to get everything fixed.The two weeks he drove me to work were living hell.  He liked to play a game I called "how close can I get to the car in front of me".  He'd be on the freeway, going so fast he'd end up almost on top of the car ahead of him.  If they didn't move or speed up, he'd get as close as physically possible without touching ... until they either moved or a highway patrolman pulled him over and gave him a ticket.  Astonishingly he rarely got tickets ... go figure.About a mile or two before we got to work, my Brother would stop over to buy coffee and donuts.  He'd place his cup of hot coffee on the dashboard, tilted slightly against the windshield.  He told me it was "Just enough to keep it from falling over." I knew that Hot beverages coffee and tea are served at temperatures between 160 degrees F (71.1 degrees C) and185 degrees F (85 degrees C). Hot enough to cause signNow burns with even a short exposure.  Which is why I snatched the coffee off the dashboard intending to hold it ... rather than face scalding."Put the damned thing back!" yelled my Brother.  "The cup ain't never tipped over before ... and it ain't fall'n now!" Still holding the hot coffee, I looked at my Brother and shook my head no.  "You'll forgive me if I don't want to take a chance at getting scalded.""PUT IT BACK NOW!"  He hissed. "I told you it won't tip over.  If you want to ride with me, you need to put the cup back!"My Brother had never screamed at me before.  I was startled and frightened and quickly placed the hot coffee back on the dashboard.  At which point he threw his car into reverse and raced backwards towards the street exit.  He swiveled the car around 180 degrees, punched it into 1st, slammed on the gas and sped off onto the street ... still working the gears.By the time we arrived at work I was crying.  Grateful to be wearing sunglasses, so my Brother couldn't see my tears.  My Brother continued sitting inside his car drinking coffee and finishing his cigarette.  So I quickly unlocked the front door, turned off the alarm and ran into the bathroom.For the two weeks he drove me ... my Brother took the same route to work ... purchased the same cup of coffee, always tipping it against the windshield ... always driving as if the devil were on his tail.  He smoked (despite my asthma ... which he didn't believe I had).  Some days he played heavy metal or acid music so loudly that I could barely think ... and my ears rang for hours afterwards.I was grateful when my car was fixed well enough that I could again drive myself to work.About a year after my brother had began working at my office, he started calling in sick to work a lot.  He told me he was fine but needed to finish fixing up his house.  I felt conflicted, as I loved my job and the people I worked for.  I'd never lied to an employer before and didn't want to start now.  After weeks of keeping his secret, I told my Brother the next time he called in NOT to ask for me.  He could tell the receptionist.  He kept calling me, so one day I lost it and told him to stop asking me to lie for him, because I wasn't going to do it anymore.  I told him I loved my job and that the boss treated me like family ... so I wasn't going to lie to him ever again.  He mumbled "whatever" and hung up.One of my jobs was to check the FAX machine for junk.  I'd put the good FAXs into the proper mailboxes and make sure urgent faxes were hand delivered.  One day a fax came in for my Brother from his wife Angie.  I hadn't known she'd been away house hunting in Colorado.  I picked up and looked at the heading ... "How do you like our new house?  We're MOVING Babe!"  I was stunned and overwhelmed with sadness.I brought the fax to my Brother's office.  I handed it to him without saying word.  I remember looking at him and thinking "why"?He ripped the FAX from my hand and began screaming at me.  "Now you're SPYING on me?!  I was stunned by the intensity of his words.So now you know.  I'm moving.  I'm finally getting away from all this bullshit.  So run to the phone quick and call Mommy, just like you always do!  Now you know why I'm leaving and why I NEVER tell you anything."In my entire adult life I had never betrayed my Brother.  When he was between marriages I introduced him to friends (two of whom he married), and took him places.  When he was low on money, I bought him clothing.  When his car wasn't working, I loaned him mine.  I never NEVER betrayed a confidence to our Mom.  I would have given my life for my Brother.Hearing him basically call me a selfish and manipulative bitch was mind blowing, and destroyed any remnants of self worth I still had.  He stormed out of his office, gave the boss two weeks notice and then left for the day.I spent the rest of the day moving boxes in the warehouse, restocking supplies ... ANYTHING and everything I could think of to help me avoid crying.  At noon, when everyone had left to get lunch I sat down in the back of the now empty warehouse and wept.The boss found me there, and asked me to come into his office.  "You're a good sister to your Brother and a good daughter to your parents.  You have also been a good employee to me.""I remember you telling me that your Brother is better than you in everything.  You agreed to less money, so he could have more.  You are better than him ... better than a hundred of him.  I'm glad he's going.  You should be to."---------------------------------------------------------There is much much more to this story than I could ever hope to post on Quora.  Perhaps my second book will be about my relationship with my Brother.  For now I need to stop, or I won't be able to function today.  I'm in tears as I write this, and need to get up and out of the house soon ... before I lose it completely.I miss my Brother ... not the mean and arrogant asshole I just wrote about ... the one my heart remembers as a kind caring and loving individual.  Even if my Brother only existed in my dreams ... I loved that dream Brother and will ALWAYS miss him.The hardest part is knowing that other than my Dad ... I've been without a loving and caring family for almost my entire life.  Knowing there's NO living family member out there I can ask to help me sort this all out is heartbreaking ... seeing the truth of who everyone really was, and how badly they treated me, is unspeakably difficult.I wish I could go home ... had a family home ... had my own children and my own family.  I'm old and live with a broken old man with problems of his own.  So I'm basically alone, and have been for a very long time.Here's to the Brother I remember and still dream about.  I miss you Dicky and wish you were here ... wish we could play music together ... watch dumb science fiction movies ... make stupid jokes ... laugh ... live ... breathe.  May God grant us both peace and happiness.

As an independent IT tech contractor I have had lots of idiots try to skip payment. Boy have I got stories.One dumbass lawyer decided He would not pay for his onsite laser printer service ( new drum cartridge, toner, reset and test, I think it was for $350). So I put a lien on his building for that plus 2% per month forever.I got a surprise Cheque in the mail for the whole works about a year later - because he needed to pay his mortgage or sell the building or whatever. Dumbass.Another lawyer didn’t want to pay me after I removed all the virus’s out of his computer. I had it setup to auto-reinfest the viruses all back on his computer if he didn’t pay me right then and there. ( he was a notorious jerk, I was ready for his dumbass move in advance). He paid.Most people are normal. May not like that they had to fix their computer but all in all they do. Not a big deal. I totally love good people, and the bad ones hate me.But my absolute favorite is from years ago ( early 90’s) when my office was in Vancouver on the 2nd floor of this little industrial area.I Got a call from this secretary one morning across the street from me, her computer was down, she saw my sign across from her so she desperately needed help and called me over. I looked out the blinds and she waved - so I grabbed my tools and walked over. A few hours later I had fixed her computer, got her printer working, wasn’t much. Everything working. All good. Sent them a bill for $130 and went on with my day. A month later the owner hasn’t paid so I send them a friendly reminder. Nothing. A few weeks go by and I call up and get the owner and introduce myself, and casually remind of the overdue invoice, and he starts yelling at me telling me that he’s just not going to pay for it because he doesn’t believe that I fixed anything. That’s because by the time he arrived for work I had fixed it already. Nevertheless he was beligerant about it and hung up on me. I tried again a few days later and he was worse. It was weird.Anyways I would normally just submit an overdue invoice to a collection company and let them hassle them and finally get a payment in for whatever, but I had an idea. You see this was back in the early 90’s and I was the tech writer ( in my spare time) for a large newspaper and I would write reviews on cool new tech gadgets. I had just got in the latest greatest gadget - the very first printer port fax machine. It was so cool ( at the time). It could take my word processing document, and set itself up as a printer and it would let me fax it to any fax machine on the planet just by inputting a phone number. Today that’s old hat. Back then that was unheard of. SoI created a document page from a fictional debt “continuous collection corp” with that $130 for services. It was all very official looking and so I input their fax number and hit the send button. I could hear it dialing to across the street, handshake with their fax, and I could see their huge Enormous fax machine print out the page, cut the page off the roll and it dropped down into a basket. I watched as the secretary took it out and handed it to the beligerant owner who read it, crumpled it up and tossed it.Oh this was going to be fun.Just before closing time I send it again, and watched him crumple it and toss it away.I waited until he turned off the lights, and everybody went home. Then I resent the fax but this time I sent it 9,999 times.I could hear the computer chunking away and watched for awhile as their fax machine started chunking out page and page and page, until it overflowed the basket. By now we had three or four guys all howling with laughter looking out our windows. Laughing to the point of tears. At this point we could care less if he paid his bill, we were having so much fun with this.So we all went home while the computer stayed on.In the morning I drove in early and parked and we went immediately up and peered out the window - to see my computer had worked all night until their fax machine exhausted itself of thermal paper and there was Collection notices spilled out all over the floor and covering the office.We were beside ourselves laughing at this. Then we watched this guy come in and start raving and screaming and kicking the paper all over- and he grabbed big garbage bags and had everyone stuffing the paper into them, bailing them up and filling about 6 large bags which he through out the back door. We were pissing ourselves laughing across the street.We had used up about $200 worth of his thermal fax paper! It was expensive in those days.His secretary doing her due diligence carried on with her duties, including replacing the fax machine thermal paper with another giant ass roll. Omg this was too good.At the end of my day I reset my computer and had it redo the collection notice, same thing, for a million copies. I hit the button and left.Next morning we were all there bright and early to watch the show, and right on cue the boss came in but this time the entire office was full of paper. Thousands of pieces of paper!!!! Thousands.The anger and venom was glorious to watch. We could hear him screaming g from across the street.In the end he pulled the plug on his fax machine but by then we were out of tears laughing. And we started to feel bad for the poor secretary there who had to work for this moron.I decided we had gotten more than our moneys’ worth of entertainment value out of this. I stopped the continuous collection notices. But oh boy was that fun.

Unfortunately most people want to quit their jobs on some level. Everyone has something about their job that they don’t like. Even people who seem to have not just their dream job but everyone’s dream job have something that they don’t like.Take this guy for example:He gets paid tens of millions of dollars a year to win super bowls. He has one of the best bosses in the world in Bill Belichick. He’s the most watched and most successful TV personality in history with 30 million people tuning in every week and 100 million+ in February. He gets to work with his friends and fellow superstars such as Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman. Despite all his good fortune even he has complaints. He knows that he has the best job in the world but will always be demanding more. This hunger for more is what has made him successful, he wants perfection in everything he does. Know that most people are considering a career change, they want more, they want less, they want something different. Most people are scared though. They’ve been groomed to believe is a cruel world and they need to cling to safety. They don’t want to give up their current level of “success” because they may not find something better.I have chronically worried about my career, money, jobs, clients, everything; so this is a position I have been in many times before. Here are the things to consider before you make a decision, they may push you to quit …. or make you realize you should be happy where you are at.Almost nobody cares what you do: I used to think that everyone cared what I did for a living because that’s the first thing people ask when they meet you. The reality is it is just small talk and an attempt to be polite. Nobody actually cares, or even notices, what you do for a living. For years I thought I needed to have a high status position to be respected in the world. Eventually I learned that doing something enjoyed was far more important that having an impressive title that I could tell people about at cocktail parties. If you can make a living selling artwork and that’s what you love to do, then do it. Not everyone should try to be a doctor.A regular job isn’t safe: Most of the world is under the delusion that a salaried job is somehow safer being self employed or owning a business, or even being unemployed. I’ve been fired and laid off more than once. Your job is only as safe as your employers business (usually less safe). If business slows down, you get axed. I’ve had employers who couldn’t make payroll and one day my checks just bounced. I had a company go through a merger and move offices, in doing so they had duplicates of many positions so 30% of the office was let go. I’ve seen executives arbitrarily decide that they want to cut expenses in a department and lay people off. I’ve seen CEO’s fire people just to make a scene and “motivate” everyone else. Just because your paychecks come on schedule doesn’t mean their is any added safety. All this gives you is a false sense of security.Being self employed brings diversity- I’ve never met anyone who was self employed limited themselves to one client. When you have a variety of customers, you have a variety of revenue streams, making your income much more diverse and reliable. Many small business owners will eventually own multiple businesses. Business owners start to learn and understand thy dynamics of an industry which allows them to see opportunities others don’t.Owning a business allows you to play offense- In your personal financial picture, you want to increase the amount of offense that you play, meaning you need to make more money. Owning a business allows for this possibility in a way that most normal jobs cannot. A big year in your business might make multiples of your annual salary. Most salaried workers have zero opportunity to cash in on a big pay day, they mostly just get marginal raises and bonuses.Employers do what is best for them- Most employees are at the mercy of their employers. Even the best employers are going to ultimately protect themselves before you. This means they are going to pay you just enough to so that you don’t quit and nothing more. I’ve don’t real estate consulting for several large Fortune 500 businesses, trust me they are constantly considering ways to downsize or relocate offices. I’ve been in dozens of meetings with executives when decisions are made on when to close a plant or where to move an office. My job is to research information on different locations, tax advantages, real estate costs, shipping costs; not one executive has ever been concerned with what happens to the soon to be former employees personal life.Virtually all of the wealthy people own a business- There are some high paid executives, doctors, and lawyers, but for the most part nearly everyone who is wealthy owns a business. Even the wealthiest employees (Tom Brady) make pennies compared to their bosses. Depending on the nature of your business you may be able to sell it when you want to move on or retire. Imagine if your boss offered you 7 years worth of salary as severance to quit your job. This happens all the time with small businesses. They start to generate cash flow and grow and somebody offers the owner 5–10x their annual profit to acquire the company.The stats you hear about how many businesses fail are overstated- Yes it’s true that most businesses close within a few years, but this isn’t always a bad thing. Today most people leave their jobs in under five years. Even if your business fails in a few years, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth making money before then. They also close for good reasons, like the owner sold parts of the company or got hired by a client or closed down to start a different business. Rather than worry about abstract success rates that have nothing to do with your specific business, consider what would happen to you if your business failed. How much money would you lose? Could you give it another shot and start another business? How does the worst case scenario compare to the best case scenario? Odds are when you account for everything, it’s not as scary as you initially think. For me, I’ve always tried to start my new ventures while still earning income from somewhere else, whether it be a job or different business. I keep my initial investment small so that all I have lost is a little time. Generally the decision comes down to risking a few thousand dollars and a little time and in return possibly having a life changing career move. I try to do everything to mitigate the risks while a build confidence in the new venture.Starting a Business Isn’t as Complicated as it sounds: You already work for a business and hopefully understand the industry. Every business in the world comes down to creating a buying a product or service, then selling it for more than what it cost you. Startup businesses create what is called a Minimal Viable Product (MVP) which is essentially a minimal prototype of their product that is created to test the market. You should create a minimum viable business. Think about a business idea and write down everything that is standing between you and making your first sale. I have a friend that recently started a swimwear company. She wanted to do something like this for years but didn’t because she thought she needed tens of thousands of dollars to hire designers and get something manufactured. She made a list of everything she needed to make her first sale and thought of the cheapest and easiest solution for every problem. These solutions don’t need to be sustainable long term, they just need to work in a pinch at a volume of 1. She bought some outlet fabric for about $50, used her mom’s sewing machine, asked a few of here friends to model and took pictures with a cell phone. She set up a basic website for about $100 and made her first sale. She had a business up and running in a few weeks with about $300 in startup capital.Bigger isn’t always better: It’s easy to think that the industry giants have the advantage, but there are a lot of advantages to being small. Wal-Mart might have enormous purchasing power and a reliable customer base, but their size costs a lot of money. Large organizations spend most of their money on back office expenses such as accountants, lawyers, middle management, etc. They also spend a fortune on wasted inventory, unused real estate and employees that aren’t busy, all things that don’t help them sell product. When you’re starting, you can work out of your house, you can do most things yourself or hire outside help on an as need basis. Wal-Mart spends hundreds of millions of dollars every year on expenses like accountants, lawyers and HR. Your small business probably doesn’t need to worry about any of theses things at the start.Your Job Isn’t Moving You Forward- If you are reading this, you probably don’t like your job and it’s not moving you closer to your goals. Imagine where you ideally want to be in five years. Every decision you make either moves you closer or further from that goal. If you job isn’t moving you forward, it’s moving you back.Take inventory of your life, it you hate your job, move on. You don’t want to spend your whole life doing something you hate.

The question being answered is: Were you glad the courts struck down Trump administration's orders that would make it easier to fire federal workers? Answer: I was not glad the judge made the decision she did. When I read the Executive Orders earlier this year, I thought to myself that it was about time somebody tried to get these yahoos in these Federal Labor Unions under control. I became a supervisor in the Federal Government in 1987 and retired in the fall of 2017. I have fired at least a couple of hundred Federal employees and the only ones that weren’t a giant pain in the butt were su...

Sure! Done right, it's an amazing experienc, but done wrong it will have a negative and all-encompassing effect on your life. I've had both.The very first time I heard the word ‘surrogate’ was when I was told that I'd need one. I’d had a horrible pregnancy, ending in a heartbreaking loss that necessitated a lot of interventions, including several D&C’s and antibiotics etc. After it was all over, I was diagnosed with Asherman’s Syndrome (intrauterine scarring) and told that I might face fertility issues. I requested to be panelled, which meant that a group of consulting specialists would get together and collectively review a patient’s file and decide on a course of action or a diagnosis and treatment, if there was any. I remember meeting 7 doctors that all told me, one by one, that pregnancy would be impossible; one doctor actually had the gall to compare me trying to get pregnant to nailing a picture in a crumbling wall full of holes. Through tears, I asked those “specialists” what my options were, because I'd always wanted children, and one doctor replied that adoption was always an option, or later, I could find a surrogate. I asked what a surrogate was and he replied that it was a woman that has a baby for you. I cringed, picturing the Hollywood version of the destitute, but fertile, young woman that moves into my house for however long and into my marital bed for 3–5 nights so that she and my future husband could make a baby and pass it off as mine. Um, no!I became a fertility consultant so that I could help people experience that miracle, and I could enjoy pregnancy and birth by proxy. It helped ease the sting a bit but nothing truly ever took the pain away. I cried sometimes, especially on the first day of my period, and always found a suitable reason (excuse) to miss any baby showers or Christenings or naming ceremonies. One of my friends had a baby girl and I was obligated to visit her in hospital, but didn't stay long enough to even take off my coat and stumbled out in a weepy, emotional mess because although I wanted it so much, I'd never have those experiences.Fast forward a few years and a relocation to Ontario, and I found myself at the doctor’s office again, complaining about irregular periods and cramps on my left side. He explained that I probably had a cyst on my ovary, which is common in Ashermans women; their bodies can't understand why they aren't getting pregnant so the body ramps up the fertility hormones, but to be sure he sent me for an ultrasound. I went next door to the ultrasound clinic and 10 minutes later I was in an ambulance en route to the hospital for treatment of an ectopic pregnancy. I woke up feeling worse than before, because I realized that I had fertilized however many embryos that never had a chance to grow, and I felt like I’d had dozens of abortions. I spoke to the doctor and told him to tie my tubes, do a hysterectomy, whatever, just to make sure that I could not ever fertilize another egg. He agreed, but told me that I should have one spontaneous menstrual cycle and then come back to him to discuss options and make plans. I came back a few months later and told him that he had done something wrong, that at least I used to bleed, but hadn’t since the ectopic issue. In hindsight, I was very abusive to him. He asked if there was anything else going on, were my breasts sore (yes, they were always sore when my period was due!) was I nauseous at all (yes, I had a stomach flu!) was I tired (yes, I’d been working a lot!) and on it went. He asked me for some urine and then I understood what he was getting at and started to cry, begging him not to do that to me. He replied that pregnancy had to be ruled out before any other tests were done, and I relented. He did the test in front of me and the stick went in white and came out vivid blue. Glowing, Microsoft blue. He told me I was pregnant and I told him he was an asshole, then left angry and went about my life, missing every obstetrical ultrasound that he dared to schedule for me. I wasn't an obstetric patient, therefore I had no need for an obstetric ultrasound, right? Eventually this doctor called me at work and invited me to prove him wrong, so to do exactly that, I left work and went to the clinic for my ultrasound, fully expecting to see the same empty and barren mess that I had always seen on a sonography screen. The tech did the usual, measuring this and recording that and then invited me to look at the screen. I saw what looked like an unshelled peanut, the combination of a fetal head and abdomen, and in that abdomen was a beating heart. That transducer was on my belly, and that was my name on the screen and those were my baby's measurements the upper corner and that was my due date beside it, with a date that was 5 months distant and in that split-second, my life was entirely different. No words can explain or describe what that felt like, intense euphoria followed by intense regret. I hadn't believed that it was possible, so I hadn't been behaving like a pregnant woman should. I threw my cigarettes in the garbage before I even got dressed and ate a large, nutritious meal on the way home, which promptly got rejected, and I set about making the changes necessary for Motherhood and waited for my baby. My baby!I went overdue and finally birthed a healthy fat gorgeous baby boy, very quickly. Having spent a long time learning and teaching about fertility, I knew that women are never more fertile than right after a pregnancy, so I started thinking that maybe I could get lightning to strike twice. Well, lightning struck, and I carried and birthed my 2nd son, 13 months after his big brother. I was ecstatic! My doctor warned against pushing the envelope, so I went on birth control pills. When my older son was 2, I dropped a birth control pill down the drain, and that was son #3. Son #4 followed, and so did his siblings, until I had 7 sons and 3 daughters.Following the birth of my youngest baby, I started to give serious consideration to the miracle that I had been given. Yes, the doctors were wrong about me but they wouldn't and couldn't be wrong about everyone, and somewhere in the world there was a good and deserving woman that, through no fault of her own, still cried the same tears that I had cried and I wanted, needed to help her and take that pain away.I got in touch with a surrogacy agency in Canada and filled out the ream of paperwork, applying to their program as a surrogate. I was accepted and I was sent 3 dossiers of intended parents. The surrogacy consultant had told me about a couple that she had been thinking about and I spent a long time thinking about them before I'd received the 3 files, but I put that couple’s file aside and tried hard to be objective as I read through the other 2 files. The 1st couple had children from prior relationships but she’d had a hysterectomy and they wanted a baby together. The 2nd was similar but he’d been rendered a paraplegic following an accident and she had been his nurse and they’d fallen in love; they wanted a baby together and planned to finance IVF and surrogacy with his settlement. Both of those couples looked like okay people, but didn't feel right. I picked up the 3rd file and started to read. Midway through the 1st page, I had to put it down and take a minute to compose myself. Charles and Marie were a traditional married male-female couple, and Marie had been diagnosed with Rokitansy-Mayer-Küster-Hauser Syndrome and her bravery and courage and commitment leapt at me off of the page. They were young, beautiful and deeply in love and their hope matched their commitment. She had uterine issues just like me, mine was broken and hers was absent and we both had functioning ovaries. Marie even mentioned how frustrating that was. She was the same age that I had been when I had been given that heartbreaking, and fortunately wrong, diagnosis, except hers was correct. She felt the frustration I had felt knowing that ovulation was happening but the embryo had no place to develop and I knew without asking that she had cried the same rivers of tears that I had cried too. ‘Them!’ my internal voice screamed, ‘Them! They're right! It's THEM!’Marie and Charles lived in Europe and sought a surrogate in Canada because our laws made citizenship much easier, plus Canada has a high percentage of French speaking people, which I was, but rusty. I told the agency right away that I wanted to work with them. They were sent my file via fax because Marie demanded it once she was told about me, and Marie called the following Sunday. We spoke a little and cried a lot, and developed a method of translating emails that still makes me laugh. That was August and we were ready to start transferring embryos by November.Pregnancy by IVF isn't easy to achieve though. I was evaluated medically and physically and emotionally and psychologically. I was given strong drugs and a very intense schedule of do’s and don'ts. I was put into chemical menopause and then my endometrium was built up and readied for it’s new occupant with more hormones and steroids and blood thinners and prophylactic antibiotics. The transfer itself happened sooner than expected because Marie had triggered a bit early and the embryos weren't doing very well. Out of 24 eggs, only 11 developed and of those, only 7 were considered even remotely viable. I was given the 3 best embryos on day 3 of their development, and quietly told to not get my hopes up. One nurse even said that they'd see us next month. Marie was holding my hand as her baby seeds were transferred into my uterus and I relaxed and waited the requisite hour with Marie by my side the entire time. We left and went home, and walked in to hear the phone ringing; the clinic called to tell Marie and Charles that the remaining 4 embryos had collapsed, so all they had, all of their hopes and dreams, were in me. My past reared it’s ugly head and I refused to be written off again. I was determined to do all that I could to get pregnant and stay that way and surprised everyone by doing exactly that! Marie and Charles lived with me during the retrieval and fertilization and transfer period and it was a beautiful time in all of our lives. I'm delighted to say that I jumped the gun and got my blood tested early at a walk-in clinic, so that Mom was able to hear those words right from the confused doctor’s mouth, ‘'You're pregnant. Um, well, she’s pregnant. Um, well, she’s, er, you're going to have a baby!’I had an early ultrasound as part of the IVF protocol and I remember looking at that tiny little comma of a baby and thinking ‘Do you know how much you're loved already?’Because there's no safe way to know exact amounts, protocol dictates that a surrogate be given plenty of supplementary hormones using pills and injections and vaginal suppositories, for a minimum of 6 weeks before the embryo transfer and at least 12 weeks after. The hormone injections are an oil so you need a bigger gauge needle and by my 13th week of pregnancy, my ass looked like a Monet masterpiece from all the injections. The high doses of hormones tend to exaggerate the usual pregnancy symptom, so you're not a little bit tired, you're wiped right out. You're not a little bit sick, you're extreme. Your breasts aren't tender, they're on fire and I walked around with my arms crossed in front of me for 2 months to safeguard against any bumps. Aside from the injections and resulting exaggerated morning sickness, it was an easy pregnancy and I put intense effort into making sure that Mom and Dad were kept very involved. I was acutely aware of what it was like to need another woman to carry your baby, so I adopted a strict policy of making absolutely certain that all the firsts weren't mine alone, driving my Midwives crazy in the process. Our Midwives were excellent, even rearranging their staff structure so that the only French speaking Midwife was on my team. It became a routine; I would provide a schedule of my pre-natal appointments to Mom and Dad and I would send a quick email when I was leaving my house and again when I arrived at the Midwives office, then Mom would call and I'd hand the phone to the Midwife, who would then do the entire appointment with the phone tucked between her shoulder and her ear. In this way, Mom and Dad were able to hear the baby’s heartbeat at the same time that I did and they would get information directly as it was determined and have the opportunity to ask questions and be very involved. I had an ultrasound and explained the situation to the technician and asked her to write the baby’s gender down on a piece of paper and seal it in an envelope. I went to a scheduled appointment with my Midwives right after and she opened the envelope on the phone to Mom, announcing that I carried a baby girl.It was around this time that my Midwives strongly advised Mom to secure the very best travel insurance that she could find, and to make sure that it covered hospitalization. They were unable to explain why, but continued to strongly suggest it. Mom agreed and followed their advice.I saw first-hand all that these brave and selfless and amazing people had been through in order to become parents, and I didn't want to make them wait longer than necessary so I’d sought a social induction and Mom arrived on Monday, 2 days before I was scheduled to be induced. Mom and I walked into the hospital together holding hands and she was there for all of it. The Midwife cleared the baby’s head and shoulder and invited Mom to catch her daughter, which she did. The Midwives invited Mom to cut the umbilical cord and when they took baby girl to attend to her, Mom collapsed on me, sticky and wet with birth, hugging me and speaking the only English words she knew, 'Thank you! Thank you! THANK YOU!’ Word spread through the hospital about what was going on and nurses, Midwives, student doctors, health care aides, even a janitor came in to see and congratulate us and wish us their best, and they all started crying and of course my Doula and Marie and I were all crying happy, triumphant tears; there wasn't a dry eye in the ward. Both Marie and I were too busy, me crying and watching this brave and courageous woman become a Mom and Marie in awe of her daughter, to notice that the primary Midwife had disappeared until she returned with paperwork for Mom to sign and bracelets for her wrist; one that matched her daughter and allowed access to the nursery that the baby would never be relinquished to and the other for Marie as a patient. They admitted Marie to hospital for “nonspecific abdominal issues”, but there was nothing wrong with her. They knew that she didn't want to miss a single second of her daughter’s first days, and also because the Midwives, in their unique wisdom, wanted to provide a supportive and watchful environment for the transition of baby going from being in my care to being in her Mom’s. Plus, Marie was a new Mom and could use some support. The next 3 days were amazing; insular and protective, Marie worshipped her daughter and was the fantastic Mother I knew she would be. We laughed together and loved and I'm still so proud of her.I had been a bit concerned about how I would feel, and how it would be for Marie to bond with her daughter because in theory, baby girl had been hearing my voice and my heartbeat and had been rocking in my body to the rhythm of my world and it should have been me that she was used to and took comfort from, so I expected a period of adjustment. Nope! Baby girl was born and came out looking for her Mom and it was Mom that she wanted and Mom that comforted her. On the night of the day she was born, I left to use the bathroom and take care of myself as a newly postpartum woman does and as I was leaving the room, baby girl started to stir in her isolette. I was close by, just in case, but didn't hear a cry and assumed that she had gone back to sleep. I walked back into the room to find the isolette empty and baby girl snuggled in her Mom’s arms. Mom had just gone through a very intense 3 days, with a transatlantic flight and helping her daughter be born and was understandably exhausted! Marie was asleep but baby girl was awake and I looked at them together, a study in beauty. The look on Marie’s beautiful face spoke fulfillment and pride, while baby girl’s face and wise little eyes knew that she was loved and had the world in the palm of her little hand! I understood then that as long and as much as Marie had been waiting for her daughter, so too had her daughter been waiting for Marie. I was just the doorway.Charles arrived a few days later and proved himself to also be an amazing Dad. I took my Mother and children to visit and when baby girl started to fuss in my Mother’s arms, my Mother experienced a moment of uncertainty as to who to pass her to. Her Mom, of course. Dad was flipping a steak and my job was done.Baby girl will be 13 next year. I keep in touch with them still and recently found out that she's studying English in order to better talk with me when we visit them in Europe next spring.You asked about experiences and there were plenty, but one huge thing stands out. Strangers would ask about my pregnancy, how far along are you, is this your first, etc. and when I told them that I was carrying as a surrogate, I always got one of the same two reactions; the person would open a dialogue about their daughter or daughter in law or niece or neighbour or someone else in their world who had experienced infertility and they would tell me what an amazing and generous thing I was doing. Or, the person would be aghast, asking me how I could do that, carry a baby for 9 long months and feel it grow and move and then just give it up? Well, both are wrong. I'm not an amazing and generous person, I’m a woman that was given a miracle and wanted to give a bit of that miracle back because I had red in my ledger and needed to say thanks to the Universe. It wasn't a one-sided act of generosity because I was given plenty of gifts and memories too! Just imagine the trust and confidence that was given to me and I was only one small part of a miracle where the sum total was enormously bigger than its parts. And no, I'm absolutely not carrying and birthing and giving the baby up, I’m giving the baby back!As a really cool footnote, I had a saline ultrasound during the medical evaluation part of things. The Doctor approached me and asked if he could use my images in a professional capacity, to show his infertile patients what a perfect uterus was supposed to look like. I consented and signed off on my permission and release, then smiled a bit, wishing I could package that experience and mail it to each of the 7 “specialists” that had told me that I’d never be pregnant, but since I couldn't do that, I’d have to just enjoy it for myself, that the uterus they all told me was broken and barren was now to be used as the example for the uterus that everyone should be so lucky to have!

As a startup founder of three years myself, I can relate to how legal housekeeping can be messy. Once a year, I have our own lawyers go through and do an audit of all of our legal paperwork (which costs a couple thousand dollars to be extremely thorough, but it’s worth it). Luckily, there are now many ways to easily manage and track all of your legal, financial, and HR documents via third-party sites that specialize in these management proceedings. I wrote a blog post about this awhile back titled “5 Ways to Save Time Dealing With Documents” which highlights certain sites that can be very beneficial depending on what paperwork you’d like to track or manage. They are as follows:1. GroupDocsGroupDocs is a new, comprehensive online service for document creation and management. It has multiple features, including a viewer for reading documents in your browser, an electronic signature service, an online document converter, a document assembly service, a feature for comparing different versions of a document, and an annotation feature. An individual plan is $10 per month for limited storage and 500 documents, while a group plan for up to 9 people is $19 per user per month. Based on the number of features and pricing, GroupDoc is a good-value purchase for a small business. As you’ll see below, GroupDocs can be cheaper than a service that offers only one such feature.2. signNowWhen you’re closing a deal and need to get documents signed, the last thing you need is a slow turnaround due to fax machine problems or the postal service. The solution is to use an electronic signature service such as signNow, which is one of the most popular e-signature companies in the world. This service allows you to email your documents to the person whose signature you need. Next, the recipient undergoes a simply e-signing process, and then signNow alerts you when the process is completed. Finally, signNow electronically stores the documents, which are accessible at any time. As a result, you can easily track the progress of the signature process and create an audit trail of your documents. The “Professional” plan is recommended for sole proprietors and freelancers, and costs $180 per year ($15 per month) for up to 50 requested signatures per month. The “Workgroup” plan is geared towards teams and businesses, and it costs $240 per user per year ($20 per month per user), for unlimited requested signatures.3. signNowsignNow is another e-signature service. Similar to signNow, signNow allows you to upload a PDF file, MS Word file or web application document. Next, you can edit the document, such as by adding initials boxes or tabs, and then email them out for signatures. Once recipients e-sign the document, signNow notifies you and archives the document. signNow offers low rates for these services: a 1-person annual plan with unlimited document sending costs $11 per month. An annual plan for 10 senders with unlimited document sending costs only $39 per month.4. ExariExari is a document assembly and contract management service that assists in automating high-volume business documents, such as sales agreements or NDAs. First, the document assembly service allows authors to create automated document templates. No technical knowledge is required; most authors are business analysts and lawyers. Authors have a variety of options for customizing documents, such as fill-in-the-blank fields, optional clauses, and dynamic updating of topic headings. They also can add questions that the end user must answer. Once you send out the document, the user answers the questionnaire, and Exari uses that data to customize the document. Next, the contract management feature allows you to store and track both the templates and the signed documents. Pricing is based on the size and scope of your planned implementation, so visit their website for more information.5. FillanyPDFIt’s a hassle having to print out PDF forms in order to complete them. Fortunately, FillanyPDF is a service that allows you to edit, fill out and send any PDFs, while entirely online. This “Fill & Sign” plan costs $5 per month, or $50 per year. If you subscribe to the “Professional” plan, you can also create fillable PDFs using your own documents. With this service, any PDF, JPG or GIF file becomes fillable when you upload it to the site. You can modify a form using white-out, redaction and drawing tools. Then, you can email a link to your users, who can fill out and e-sign your form on the website. FillanyPDF also allows you to track who filled out your forms, and no downloads are necessary to access these services.  The “Professional” plan costs $49 per month, or $490 per year.Switching firms can be a hassle. As a former startup attorney, I have a bit of advice about finding the right attorney for your business: it’s best to focus on the specific attorney you’ll be working with. He or she should have a solid understanding of the ins and outs of your business industry, a deep knowledge of the legal issues your startup may face, and previous work experience with startups to ensure a quality and efficient work product. This is absolutely key when matching our startup clients at UpCounsel to attorneys on our platform who can perform their legal work and hash out their legal projects in a timely manner. We also allow clients to store any and all of their legal documents directly on UpCounsel so they don’t have to go searching in alternative places for the correct paperwork. It’s proven to be a free and lightweight way to store legal documents that our clients love. Here's what it looks like:As I’ve mentioned, it’s more important to find the right attorney as opposed to the right law firm. And seeing as you’re a startup, our own startup clients typically save an average of 50-60% on their legal work, since the attorneys don't include overhead fees (a.k.a. the fees included for doing business with the firm itself) in their invoices.Hope this gives you a deeper look into what other sites and services are out there. If you have any questions or would like more information on how best to handle your legal housekeeping/ attorney matters, feel free to signNow out to me directly. As a former startup attorney at Latham & Watkins, I’d be happy to give you some guidance.