Posted by:
azsteve
(
)
Date: November 18, 2017 08:34PM
If you paid in to social security "for decades" you should not be collecting SSI, you should be collecting SSD. SSI is for disabled people who do not qualify for SSD. All you need to collect from SSD is to have paid in for fourty quarters (ten years), and to be disabled. The SSD benefits are higher. If you get regular social security, that's not SSI, it's just social security.
At age 30 (after my big crash in life that led to my losing everything and leaving the church) I went on SSD and even was on Medicare for a time, as a result of severe mental depression which was medialcally proven. The state was even paying for my apartment under a grant for the mentally disabled. My attention span and short-term memory were both shot, and I felt anger all of the time (never acted on it, just felt it - very strongly and persistantly). But with much of my life still ahead, it really wasn't where I wanted to be, just what I had to accept for the time as mental health experts and councelors assured me that I would qualify and needed to take their advice. I was on high doses of anti-depressants back then and required eighteen hours of sleep every day to feel half way normal the other six hours. With my own apartment and my needs met, I could have chosen to remain that way indefinitely.
I remember that as soon as I could, I used some of what little money I had, to get a gym membership. Most of my waking time then was spent at the gym, running on the treadmill, working out, and in a tanning bed. Over time, my daily waking hours increased. I did everything I could then to increase my seretonin levels, while getting counceling. During that time, I resigned from the church and got a girlfriend and moved in with her (gave up the free apartment). A few years later was off of the anti-depressants. I voluntarily withdrew from SSD and medicare as my income from working increased and therefore I no longer qualified for disability income. Eventually, I went to college (enrolling for the first time at age 30), ended up with two under-graduate degrees, and a Master's degree. I got my first job as a Technician roughly ten years after my big crash, and was promoted to Engineer a few years after that.
My girlfriend who let me live with her for free for most of a decade ended up having several strokes, years later. Now she is on disability and I (happily) support her now to live a nearly normal life (working around the issues caused by the strokes) but free of poverty with the Engineer's salary.
I attribute my sudden big crash in life and ten years of suffering and struggle to get back on my feet again, to the church and the culture of lies, deceit, and gaslighting that resulted in the clinical depression I went through. I may notnhave been able to bounce back the way I did (even though it took ten years) if everything that happened to me had started now, in my mid-50's. But in cases where the mental issues are a result of false beliefs in mormonism, a person can recover.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 11/18/2017 09:46PM by azsteve.