-both issues involved a period of time where things just got worse and worse, until they became unbearable, causing untold anxiety and fear
-both involve a time of action that is a little scary, a little painful, but so so necessary!
-both have a recovery time after where you shore up your defenses, heal the wounds, and prepare to move on to healthier and happier times!
Everything I do is touched in some way by our financial difficulties, and everything I do is touched in some way by my recent illness. So, in the one case I hire a competent surgeon to cut out the physical ailment, and in the other case I hire a competent attorney to cut out our financial ailments. Very cool that we live in a time where both are possible.
I am so thankful that I got such good advice here on the forum and met with the attorney today in person! I think it went very well and was really comfortable with him. He was very reassuring, but also let me know what some things are that might cause extra scrutiny. His quoted fee is higher than the other attorney's, but I believe that he is probably just more realistic, and the other would have ended up the same.
So now I have a big stack of forms to fill out and paperwork to put together. I'm hoping to get most of it done before my surgery on Monday, but we'll see.
The great thing is, he's having me fill out the paperwork as if we are going to file on March 1st!! If he sees any problems with that, we'll just look at filing dates further out. We haven't technically hired him yet, but he just said to take it easy and we'll sign the agreement when I get the paperwork to him - I think he's being extra gracious because of my surgery next week! 
Here we go...