I know that when my father had his stroke that there was a limit to what you had to pay (our's was 2,000 dollars) after that the company paid the remainder of the bills. Not sure if this is the case with your insurance company but you might ask. Also, my sister had a similar situation, and the bills were so enormous with three small children to raise that she was forced to declare bankrupt but was told by her lawyer to wait until all the bills were in. I myself had a similar situation with total payments of a couple thousand dollars and I paid each a small sum each month to show good faith until it was paid off. Some of them didn't want to wait and turned it over to a collection agency at the end of the year. I think they wanted to clear the books. I tried sending the money to the collection agency but they returned my check. I never understood that. Sorry to hear about your problems. I feel for you because I am one of those people who feel stress when I can't pay bills and ended up with an ulcer which doesn't help matters at all but creates new debt.