Lower Ball Joints and Suspension

Hello,

I'm new to the forum and I've been unable to find the following information. I just did a Cross-Country trip of the United States in my 2004 Frontier 4x4 V6 King Cab XLE(I think). When I was in the Cascades (Northern Washington State) I ended up having an accident. I was going into a mountain pass, where there looked to be a slight dusting of snow. It ended up being a solid sheet of black ice under that dusting, and my rear end sling-shotted me into a guard rail going about 35 mph head on. Needless to say I destroyed the stock bumper and twisted the frame rails a bit. That was all fixed by the Insurance company.

Unfortuately when I took it to a shop to have the steering aligned after the accident, they informed me that I needed to replace both of my Lower Ball Joints as well. They gave me an estimate of $1100-1200 for the repair, and I ended up driving the truck all the way back to NC. When I call the shops around here they're informing me that in order to replace the ball joints, you also have to replace the lower control arms as they don't come seperate... which are $400 a piece. Is this true?

Are there aftermarket ball joints that I should be looking at instead?

Is there something I should be thinking of doing to my truck as I already have to replace the Lower Ball Joints?

I'm also wondering, as I have 118000 miles on the truck and the suspension is getting loose does anyone know how much it will cost to re-do the suspension?

I'm starting to think that it might be time to try and trade it in for a newer model if it's going to become astronomically expensive in the near future.

Thanks for any information anyone provides. I haven't been able to find much information on LBJ's