Posts Tagged ‘disability’

17
Nov
2020

Soon, I have another disability hearing. Go me.

categories: personal; word count: 352 words

In my spare time, I’ve been stylizing our YouTube channel in the hope that at some point I can get it off of the ground. I’ve been uploading most of the videos that I posted on Facebook to it in the event that, for whatever reason (and trust me, there are several) I do decide to leave Facebook, that way the videos that I’ve taken of my kids are stored elsewhere… and I’m also backing up all of the pictures that aren’t on Instagram and posting them on MeWe for that same reason, now that I know that enough of my friends use it that it’s not a waste of time to have an account. One thing that the site has going for it is that it looks nice and is easy to navigate. Now more people need to move off of Facebook and onto it, or off of Facebook and onto just about any site that isn’t owned by Facebook. The entire point of the process here is to get away from Facebook…

In the interim, I’m continuing to fight for disability benefits with chronic, intractable migraine disorder as my primary diagnosis and my asthma as… something that exists and is there. I have literally heard “you’re smart, you can adapt (to other work)” so many times that if that alone could induce vomiting, it would. My gaming backlog has only increased by leaps and bounds because I have to be careful about using electronics, those being a huge trigger for… wait for it, migraines. There are things that I want to do that I can’t do when I want to, or even at all, because of my migraines, so this “adaptability” is bullshit on the part of the people that want to insist that I am capable of adapting, let alone to work. I expect that I will have to continue to fight for disability benefits and I will be pleasantly surprised if I do not at just about any point.

But honestly, I can see why some people give up. They’re forced to do so through a dehumanizing process.

13
Nov
2020

I still need to come up with better subjects…

categories: personal, simulators; word count: 274 words

I’ve decided not to walk every single day on my treadmill, because my lungs aren’t acclimating to it as fast as I thought they would… for someone who went into this knowing that it would take them awhile to get used to exercising anyway, especially with the severity of asthma that I have. Some people have told me that “if I keep at it”, “it” being exercise, that my body and lungs will “get used to it”, and that’s how I’ll get fit and have better lung function… but in spite of almost literally trying this six ways from Sunday, I’m not seeing those results, so I’m going out on a limb here and speculating that those people are understating the frequency and severity of my asthma. For some reason, that seems to be something that happens. People think they can make the most “helpful” suggestions, and then when those suggestions don’t work, it’s like it is a personal offense to them. And it’s not as though I don’t tell these very same people that I have asthma.

For some reason, our copy of The Sims 4 on the PC isn’t quite working as it should. Several panes on the ground are purple and have “?” in them, and Sims are literally getting stuck ridiculously easily. I’ve tried the fix where you manually unstick them (“ResetSim”), but then they get stuck all over again… and no, I’m not running any mods. Hopefully repairing the whole thing through Origin works, because everything else on this computer works just fine and I had to fight like hell to get everything else on this computer to work just fine.

03
Nov
2020

The state of affairs is clearly a lot of opinions.

categories: personal; word count: 305 words

Good news: My gum infection hasn’t managed to spread any further, and is currently being… managed, for lack of a better way to put it. Come to find out that being on the amount of medication that I’ve been on for asthma has more or less always irritated my gums, but now it’s become a bit more noticeable to me. However, brushing my teeth at the frequency that I have and using mouthwash as liberally as I have (“the purple kind”, too) has only helped matters out. My gums do not like the current state of affairs of anything.

However, the prognosis is better than I had originally thought it was, which is comforting.

Not-quite-so-good news: I’m not managing to stay off of prednisone during this pandemic, although I am making a considerably more concerted effort to do so. If I could stay off of prednisone long-term, that would be great, but that is not where we are at right now, and I suppose that has a lot to do with why my gums do not like the current state of affairs of anything. (Symbicort does as well.) My lungs are having as many opinions on issues as my gums are, although those are more noticeable because lungs are larger than gums and they are my lungs. I’ve also grown weary of explaining to people why certain groups of people can, and should, wear masks with exhale valves… you know, the ones who will not have asymptomatic periods if they are exposed to COVID-19 and actually catch it, who need to be protected from catching the virus more than they need to protect others from catching it from them, but I digress here, I do. It’s a lot of complex science…

Bub now has Super Mario 3D All-Stars, and I’ve pre-ordered Cyberpunk 2077! Two worthwhile purchases.

23
Oct
2020

They want you to die so they don’t have to pay.

categories: personal; word count: 418 words

Soon, I will have a hearing with an administrative law judge to see if I can get approved for disability benefits… again. I’ve been told by friends of mine who are more familiar with the process (yes, the process) that the best thing to do is to put in applications, and advance them to hearings, until I am eventually approved, because Social Security wants people to give up and stop applying for benefits even though they are disabled and should not have to fight as hard as many of them do to receive benefits that they are otherwise entitled to. To make it easier on myself, I’ve begun to keep notes on my computer to remind myself of things that I want to say at my hearing even though it will be over the phone due to this pandemic. This is the same judge who has already denied me once when I put in an application for disability with my asthma as my primary disabling diagnosis… now, at the advice of my second neurologist, I’ve put in an application with chronic, intractable migraine disorder as my primary disabling diagnosis. If she remembers me, which she may, she will probably find some reason to deny me. I’m willing to play the game of putting in applications until I am eventually approved, as one of my friends’ mothers had to advance applications to a hearing four separate times to get them approved for disability benefits when they were a child on something that should not even have had to go to a hearing… that was how obvious this disabling impairment should have been to Social Security when their mother applied for them, but I digress. Seriously.

Another one of my friends said that they “deny, deny, deny” hoping that you pass away for people whose disabling conditions run the risk of death so that they do not have to pay out on any benefits. And I mean, I can get behind the deny, deny, deny part since that’s been what has been happening to me right now. I’ve been getting contradictory reasons for denial on my migraine diagnosis alone. Personally, I’m still trying to figure out how someone with between fifteen and twenty “migraine days” (yes, days) lasting between four and twelve hours who can’t even engage in hobbies that she wants to engage in to the extent that she wants to engage in them in can work, but whatever. Maybe if I keep putting in applications they’ll get it…

22
Oct
2020

“You’re intelligent, so you can adapt to work”.

categories: personal; word count: 248 words

· I have between fifteen and twenty days of migraine activity per month on average
· a lot of this has to do with how aggressively I avoid triggers, or how aggressively I can
· many of these come with nausea, which has to be worked around because… well, nausea
· wearing sunglasses when indoors does help, but this limits my vision as a result of doing so
· even being adherent to various maintenance medications, I still have at least fifteen “migraine days”

But yes. Anyone who thinks that I can “adapt to work” in spite of the migraines alone are deluding themselves. There are still people out there that actually think that I can hold down any “normal” job with the frequency and severity of migraines that I have when I can’t even indulge in video games on my off time to the extent that I would like. I have to meticulously plan out doing so around my already existing “migraine schedule” and the amount of medication that I have available to give myself at any one time, and I can not play for extended periods of time. If this is affecting what is probably my favorite hobby at this point, it is bound to affect my ability to find and keep a job. It still blows my mind that some people refuse to see this.

If I can find a job that I can do that “pays all of the bills”, I’d seriously jump on that in a second though…

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