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> > List Friends > Thanks for your concern, and your ideas and suggestions. This is mainly for > the newbies to explain the background, then i'll bring everybody up to date. > please forgive mistakes as i'm kind of stressed out and low functional. > My husband died 4 and a half years ago of lung cancer, but he was also a > manic depressive, and during manic episodes had managed to run through the > family fortune and more. We had lost everything, including having our house > foreclosed and were living on welfare in the slums of Northern Va - a small > pocket of inner city at its worst -and sometimes its best - hidden in the > middle of suburban Fairfax County. At that time, I went to Social Security to > find out my rights.- I was told that I had to choose between bereavement > benefits and SSI - because i was 45 i couldn't draw both - not until I turned > 50. So I chose bereavement berefits as on paper they looked a little higher.- > No-one saw fit to explain to me about medicaid and medicare,- nor that with > SSI I would automatically qualify for one or the other of them, while > bereavement benefits actually disqualified me from the MEDICAID Program > And so I received the princely sum of $1100 and something , divided into four > checks , one each for me and each of the children. Each check is now $306 per > month. When the girls went into Foster Care ( a long and sad tail, newbies, but > mainly it was found that i couldnt care for them because of PD!!!!!!) - their > checks went with them. and then in May Jed turned 18 and stopped getting his > payment Meantime my payment for June went up to $4o8, and looking at those > figures I realized that the total the three of us now receive. is still The > same > i.e. 3 x 408 = 4 x 306. > So now the County was getting 2/3 of the bereavement benefits. > And then came July, and no check. Meantime , Jessi has returned home. > > But the County still has legal custody of her. And I didn't get my SS > beereemenmt check this month. > > Today I finally found out that the reason for that is > because I no longer qualify, because I no longer have legal custody > of a child under 16 . Jane Amy is already 16., and anyway is in custody of > Foster Care. Apparently each girl now receives half of the total anmout =- at > least the County does. > > Meaning that everything that my husband worked for and paid taxes and had > social security payments deducted for , for all those years, is now being > paid to the County of Fairfax - to reward them for taking my children from me!!!!!!! Now on a completely different tack, I have been applying for SSI. This is probably something I should have done years ago, except that I was given the wrong advice. However I finally got the application in and have been told it will take 70 days to reach a decision. Hopefully it will go through, and I will then get medicaid. But in the meantime, I am in limbo.( this is where Janet helped me by reformatting my plea, 22 reasons why I should get SSI) This afternoon,, acting on my own initiative, and on advice from friedns, I have called my State Senator, my district Supervisor( we dont live in an incororated town, so D S = Mayor), and my Congressman. That, by coincidence, fits in neatly with the appointment I had made to see him (actually his medical aide) on THursday, on PAN related busineess. Because guess who is handling this case for me - nonoe other than the selfsame medical aide! so he has a real live glimpse into the world of PD! I recieved nothing but sympathetic reactions, and am waiting to hear further from all these places. On the other hand, I called every social worker I have had contact with or is in any way related to this case. Received mainly hums and haws, and put offs. Except for the main Foster care family socialworker, who is notoriously sweet, pleasant, inept, ineffectual and incompetent - who said,"oh, i meant to mail Jessi's check to you, because she is living with you now.' Well, fine and good so long as she remembers - but that is Jessi's support payment, not mine. The point is that I should be getting a payment, too!! If anyone wants to call my congressman, he is Tom Davies, 202 225 1492 His Virginia Office (about 3 blocks from where I live ) is actually the one that should be handling the matter. The number there is 703 916 9610 Maybe you should remind them of last year's phone-in from members of the list - which has led to one daughter coming home, and one on her way. ANd thank them, and then bring up this latest problem. I found that it worked well - everyone was very patient and understanding - as you all can well imagine, I was dyskinetic and incoherent by this point. I dont think it is xuch a good idea to phone the social security office, as I fear it would only antagonise them. ANy how, I am going to go into social security tomorrow and try and get general relief and foodstamps - and maybe even Medicaid!!!!! It is now past 4.30. Thanks to my alternating dyskinesia and dystonia, it has taken me almost 12 hours to produce this document. I'm not even going to spellcheck it; I need some sleep. Thank you all of you beautiful people. I love you all! Hilary Blue (50 / 33 dx / 24 onset)