A post elsewhere reminded me I'd been meaning to post these pages of a form several of my docs each filled out during the process, for my lawyer. In many different forms & questionnaires and such from the SSA, I suppose I also answered in these matters at various times, although, if you are going through the process, you'll see that much of the paperwork is physical disability oriented. How many pounds can you lift, and so forth.
I've said this before, but the process is hell. Part of it is looking, or trying to, look at yourself in terms of how you function, or rather, DON'T function, in certain ways, in certain capacities, to certain degrees.
Hell, just to survive, at least with me, there are many of these things you either don't see about yourself, can't see about yourself, or are sort of "blanked out" via a sort of mental "white-out" (like the office supply) because if you DID see these things, think about them, associate them, think about what it/they MEAN about you . . . . . you'd hate yourself to the depths of the universe and back, even more. You'd even perhaps try to kill yourself (as I once tried, in very, very large part because it hit me, all at once, how very poor my functioning as a human being, as a worker, as a social entity, as anything, was.) As I also came close to doing, at several points during the disability application process. When I say the process is killer, it literally could be, and I bet it has, tragically, caused some to do so.
But they'd rather prevent even one fraudulant, faker claimant (as the judge said, in his own words, though), than approve someone deserving who thought that most of these things about me, were just ME, were just flaws in my character, in my me-ness, in my who I AM-ness, in my Sara-ness, that they were JUST ME, so I had no idea that I should even bring them up to a doctor, many of them anyway. The judge pretty much said that, that they'd rather prevent one fraudulent, than let through one deserving person who had these problems, even though this deserving person had had no idea it was anything other than just being herself, that was the "wrongness". Not in those words, but it was . . . . a very bad day for me.
It was a little over a year ago now, and I still have held off at arm's length much of what this decision meant/means for me.
Anyway, here's a look at some of the jarring out of my blinders/self-protective/not even realizing how bad off I was, though I was, place I was in, when I received a questionnaire back from one of my docs:
Imagine, for a moment, that it is YOU, and you are seeing this look at yourself for the first time . . . you knew there were problems, but to see how a professional assesses you, . . . just try to FEEL that.
3 comments:
Whoa... I can see how stark those pages are, I can grasp the single dimension they are describing and have some small clue as to how needed those blinders are (from how the white-out works in my life).
I know how hard it was when my "secret weaknesses" were laid bare all at once. I thought I would suffocate as my defenses crumbled. And now you have to wade through your rubble, "bag and tag" each little piece.
You have my continued love & prayers, Sara, may you have enough teeny tiny little band-aids for all the papercuts you get during this process.
It really is reidiculous how much paperwork wastes precious trees AND Time!!
Thanks Tea, Deb, and Barb (who sent me an email!)
This process "finished" for me on Halloween of 2006, at least, that's when the hearing was. The decision took a couple of weeks for the judge to write up and mail out, and the finalizing paperwork took another couple of months.
My monthly payments of, supposedly $91 and some-odd ¢ started in late January or early February, although after two of those they reduced it to $74, I'm not sure why.
The co-pay per pyschologist appointment is $20, and at four appt.'s a month (sometimes 5, if there are five Tuesdays in a month where none are on a holiday or he or I aren't on vacation or have a conflict of schedule), so the $74.00 just about pays for those.
Except, my insurance only has 20 visits allowed, which ran out, even though we started spacing the appointments out more. So then it became I really didn't have therapy; I can't count once a month as therapy, because within 3 days afterwards, I'd have plenty of fodder for the next time, and try to hold on to the fact that I had to pick SOMETHING to narrow down on for the next appt, but by after two weeks, with two weeks to go til the next one, there was just SO MUCH that it became like putting a dot/spot bandaid on a gaping wound. Not to malign or put down my therapist! It's just . . . . it wasn't therapy. It couldn't be, for me, and I tried really hard.
Recently there's been some developments that I'll talk about soon, as far as access to help, but I went through hell for a copay. Or, it just pays the co-pay for one of my two expensive meds per month. The co-pays per month on my meds vary from $180 to over $200 (some aren't daily, some are as needed, for worse anxiety situations, for arthritis which I'm still figuring out when how why to take it especially considering all the other pharmacopeia I'm on, etc.
I turned my soul inside out for this hope, only to have it torn from my hands like, well, someone flying a helicopter in to rescue you in your liferaft, and they lower the rescuer, and then he puts his thumbs on his ears, hands spread, waggling his fingers, saying, "neener, neener, neener" and goes back up and flies off.
Kinda like that. So painful, I'm only just now starting to talk about it a bit more lately, some in comments on another blog, and some here. I may use some of those other comments as the basis for more posts on the subject here.
Tea, you describe it perfectly. I will most likely be quoting your comment in the future, if that is ok! With attribution.
Deb, if you are (still?) reading this, you should have seen how thick the files were that my lawer, the psychologist expert for the judge, the judge, and the other person that was there, each had. I think about 5-6 inches thick; and that's just what they brought to court! Hopefully we'll be able to save more trees and more people by fixing this process, somehow . . . . . I feel like blogging about this, though the issues shown on those three pages I showed are personal, and I try to carefully choose when, how, why, and the level to which I provide that, that blogging about this process will be one way of one voice showing how broken the process is, of showing that desperate change is needed.
Plus, it's probably one form of processing for me, perhaps. I don't know, lol! That's not my goal with it, if that were my goal, I'd do it privately, then perhaps share snippets.
I may do some private writing, and distill some parts for the blog; that's not a bad idea.
Guess I'm thinking "out loud" as I type, lol!
I'm manic today, but trying to keep some tether to the ground.
Maybe I'll go play pirate (I've been beta-testing an online game, Pirates of the Burning Sea, man oh man is it fun to run around, swashing my buckle and sailing and naval battles, though I'm a freetrader, not a pirate!)
Arrrrrrr . . . .
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