DrugBuyers.Com: Getting Disability Benefits (US)

This applies to all the posts mentioning SSDI.

I have been trying to do this all year but waiting to see whether I would truly lose my postion as a graduate teaching associate due to my problems. On June 5th I received a letter that I had lost my job. The letter does not directly state that I havhave lost my job, but that at this time the are unable to offer me funding due to budget constrictions. They say that, if this busget should happen to become in order at some point, I may once again be considered for a position. I, howver, know that Ilost my position because I went into a major depressive eposode, reuniting my eating disorder and essentially had to drop my classes and quit teaching for that time. Then, although I was in good mental shape this quarter and keeping up with coursework and my job, I was out for 4 weeks straight with a back injury. They let me go because my condition makes me unfit for work. I know this because, while I was doing some research work for my advisor in my advisors office as she is on one-year sabbatical, I couldn't help from glancing at some her faculty notes. Under graduate student funding review, she wrote "probably will not receive funding next year." No such notation next to anyone else's name. This was in March.

So I know that I lost my job do to my inability to perform my work as needed. Hopefully he write that letter for me soon. I presume I can consider June 5th, the date on his original letter, to be a termination of emlpoyment.

As I mentioned before. I've done alot of research on this and have been in contact with Social Security and they told me that I am absolutely ineligible for SSDI based on the amount I earned before the university. I am definitely eligible for SSI because of all the therapies I have attempted and the worsening state of my depression. That is the primary stipulation for eligibility for my disability.

Someone on the phone at student resources told me in January that I wasn't eligible for disability until my 5th year. But I bet they will turn that around and consider the year I out of the country on Fellowship not to count towards those five years. Also, she did not specify whether they would start contributing to disability/retirement after five years or whether I could get something from it. Either way I will be talking to Uni HR tommorow.

My disability is chronic, I was diagnosed at age 12. It has only become absolutely debilitating and sometimes life threatening since 1999.

I was not a work-study employee. They receive hourly paychecks every two weeks. Faculty and staff, I believe, receive their salary every two weeks. TA's receive their salary once a month. We are salied employees, and nobody bu the department contributes to our salaries. Believe me, they get a very good deal. We receive no tangible benefits, and we are not eligible for the vast majority of grants and scholarships because these go mainly to undergraduates. Their are no federally funded grants available to graduate students. Graduate students are the lowest man on the totem pole at most universities. Undergraduates are more important because they bring in money from outside sources. Graduate associateships and graduate students in general work harder and longer for less money student-employees. We definitely work harder than the majority of tenured professors; we d o the same things, but have to do more teaching and research on a consistant basis than they. TA's are not important, and after we give them some of the best years of our lives and they break or backs and our wills to live, then fire us as a result of this, nobody at the unviersity give a S*&*(&H(*T.

So, while the SSDI imformation is helpful, I noticed that pro-consult your congressman for first time results votes related to the cases of people with SSI. And the "failure to receive on the first try" results have also been with SSI.

The only first-time lickety split results came from those applying for SSDI. Maybe it depends on your area. I'll call social security about this tomorrow. Maybe they will even tell me the truth (can you imagine, though, a gov't office saying, "Yesma'am, you're correct. We reject SSI applicants automatically the first 3 times they come in unless they have alawyer.")

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"It's the end of the World as We Know it. . ."
-REM "and I'm seeking asylum in Canada"-toe