Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

Yesterday's mail contained two envelopes from the Social Security disability determination office for Massachusetts. One of them asks about any medical care I've received since the last paperwork I filed, and the other looks like a form I sent them at an earlier stage of this. That would make sense given that I asked them to reconsider turning me down. cattitude pointed out that the first thing I should do is call the lawyer who is representing me about this, so I put everything back in the envelope and wrote myself a reminder to call him today.

I called the lawyer this afternoon, and after saying he was glad I had called him right away, he asked me a bunch of questions. It took me a little while to realize that he was filling out the form as we talked, but at the end of the call he said he would fax the form over to them right away.

The lawyer also said that I can wait to update the medical information; I'd thought they might at least want to know about the pulmonologist. I did describe the balance PT, but I don't know if he added it to the "function report"; I didn't give him the therapist's name. There's no point giving them the name of my new neurologist yet, since so far I'm just a name in his appointment book.

I made that appointment with the neurologist at about 10:00 this morning, when the MS clinic at Beth Israel Lahey called me. I will be seeing him on March 21st, and somewhere between now and then I will look up the address ("Shapiro clinic, 8th floor") and the doctor's first name. Jacobson is a moderately common name, but I assume that if there were two doctors Jacobson there the scheduler would have given me his full name.

Thanks to my congresswoman's office, I now have (a PDF of) the letter saying that Social Security is denying my application for disability benefits. That is dated June 6th. The only thing that's clear about reasons (beyond that they turn down a lot of people) is that they couldn't reach the psychiatrist I was seeing for three years. However, it took me about three minutes this morning to find a phone number for her at the VA hospital, so I can provide that information.

I sent messages to two attorneys who handle this sort of case in the Boston area, and hope to hear back from one of them in the next day or so.

ETA: One of them has already called me back about an hour ago. He will be sending me paperwork so I can designate him as my representative, and other paperwork so he can talk to my doctors. He has an office in Braintree, but when I said I'd rather do a video appointment, he said we could do that or over the telephone, so we will schedule a call or zoom or something.

Also, looking at it again, they not only didn't find Dr. Segal, I don't know whether they talked to my current neurologist. It says they got information from "Mt Auburn neurology" and from one previous neurologist, Dr. Katz.

Unsurprising but still disappointing, the Social Security Administration has denied my disability claim.

For added annoyance, this information came in the form of an email saying "we have made a decision, log in to see it or wait for a letter in the mail." After some trouble logging in I was told to call to get the answer. I then spent about three minutes on the phone, most of it listening to a recording tell me how the process complied with the Paperwork Reduction Act, and that the whole thing would take about two minutes, and wouldn't I like to use their website instead.

So, what I know now is that someone made a medical decision to turn me down, and I will have sixty days to appeal the decision. That is a problem for next week, after I get the letter. *sigh*

It doesn't help that the air quality is unhealthy for sensitive people, which includes me. The alert has been extended from midnight last night until midnight tonight; I woke up coughing at five a.m.

I am very glad I kept calling the person whose name and number were on the letter about disability determination, which said "we have to hear from you by Feb. 4th," because when I got through she said my forms were already overdue. I said "I have a letter here dated Jan 25 that says you have to hear from me by the fourth," and then I explained about the forms having first gone to the wrong address. You'd think she'd be aware of what was being sent out with her name, or at least not have incorrect beliefs about it.

However, I told her that one set are going back this afternoon and that I may need a couple of days for the other; gave her my new psychiatrist's name and contact info; and found out where to send the forms back to, and also that yes I can attach additional pages with typed answers (I thought I could, but it didn't say).

Each questionnaire came with a large business reply envelope, the kind with an address window, and nothing telling me what should be showing in that window. The address the examiner gave me is on the top of the letter, in small print, so not something I could use in that window. I measured, wrote the address on a plain sheet of white paper, tried it in the envelope, and redid it half an inch up and a little to the right. Then I made multiple copies, for the other things we need to send them. I don't know if there was supposed to be a sheet of paper with that neatly printed, or if this is one more random way to unofficially disqualify applicants.

I finished the "work record" questionnaire this morning, and cattitude has taken it to the post office. I havealso drafted answers to most of the questions in the stress-inducing "tell us all about what you can no longer do" "function" questionnaire, but some bits are just "[come back to this"] or ["ask Adrian"]. And Cattitude has drafted his answers to the similar one they sent him, as a person I identified as able to talk about my disability.

[I had posted this and some other recent posts on this subject access-list-only, for no particular reason, and just unlocked them.]

I got a call a few days ago from someone at the Social Security "disability determination" office, following up on forms they'd sent me and not gotten back. They hadn't gotten the forms back because, even though I gave them a change of address last summer, they sent everything to our old address in Belmont. I told them that yes, I am still interested in pursuing this claim, please send the forms to my current address. This was all reasonable, but still not a cheerful conversation.

Two envelopes arrived in yesterday's mail. One of them asks me about my work history, which they also seem to have lost, in this case after I submitted it online.

The other envelope contained a multi-page form with lots of questions about what I can and cannot do. This is not going to be a cheerful process, and I have to send everything back by February 4th. I think we will take this to the post office and hand it over the counter, rather than risk someone breaking into a mailbox.

Also, everything has to be printed or typed using black or dark-blue ink. That effectively means it all has to be hand-written, because we no longer have a typewriter, and neither do many other private homes.

So far, I have answered the utterly straightforward factual questions on the first page, namely my social security number and daytime phone number. (They have both of those, too.) But doing that little bit means I have started on the process, which may make it easier to do more tomorrow.

It took a few calls, but I have now spoken to the woman whose name and number were on the letter I got last week.

It turns out that what I need to mail them is: nothing. The online application is complete, and after looking at my earnings report, she said the last few years of freelance work, everything since 2014, don't count as "substantial gainful activity," so she doesn't need the 2021 tax return to tell her that last year's freelance income isn't "substantial gainful activity" either.

I think the process here is: tomorrow morning she will write a "work report" based on what I told her, about having stopped looking for full-time work because I realized I couldn't handle a full-time job, and what the Social Security Administration already knows about my work history. That goes to the local disability determination office, which assigns it to an examiner. The examiner will contact my doctors for medical records, which will then be looked at by a doctor or doctors who work for them.

Somewhere in there, I will probably get a call from an examiner, or a letter asking me to call them. They may want me to be examined by a doctor who works for Social Security, but when I said "fine, if I can keep my N95 mask on" the woman said I could ask for telemedicine.

I asked how long this was likely to take, and while she doesn't know exactly -- among other things, this may depend on how efficient three or four different medical offices are -- if I haven't heard by the end of May, I should call back.


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