I thought this was a great story about a Greenville, South Carolina, special education student starting a coffee shop in his school:

Jarvis Rogers said he saw the need for the coffee shop and, in just two weeks, built the Ground Floor. … Rogers is in Special Ed, Greenville High School’s occupational diploma program. 

The full-service Ground Floor shop is the most popular spot in the Greenville High School cafeteria.

“The corporate sponsor is Liquid Highway, who donated the cash registers and all of the coffee-making equipment,” Beth Brotherton said. “And, get this, in their first week in business, this was the highest-grossing Liquid Highway location in Greenville.”

The part I really love is that Jarvis Rogers, and the other students, researched the business, developed a business plan, got a sponsor. These students really did the work to get this business off the ground (no pun intended). 

I love entrepreneurs!

Greenville Students Open Coffee Shop In School - Greenville News Story - WYFF Greenville.

I recently read this story from Dr. Mark Mostert about a major airline’s inability to deal appropriately with a person with severe hearing loss.  If the Fail Blog had a corporate failure section, this would be on it.

…my wife, Deborah, has a severe hearing impairment – both ears. Deborah wears state-of-the-art hearing aids that are only somewhat helpful.

Last week my wife turned up at the United counter in Norfolk, Virginia, to check in for her flight.

United Airlines employee: Says here you have a disability. Do you need assistance?

Deb: Yes, I’m deaf.

Puzzled silence.

United Airlines employee (somewhat sullenly): Do you need assistance?

Deb: Yes, I have a severe hearing impairment.

United Airlines employee (now a little irritated): Do you need assistance?

Deb (sighing): Yes, it’s very difficult for me to hear anything. . .

United Airlines employee (obviously ready to move on): Do you need a wheelchair?

I find this exchange interesting because it does not appear to start with malice on the part of the UA employee. I can only imagine that the UA employee could not conceive that a person who was conversing with him and responding to his questions, could label themselves as “deaf.”

Is this ignorance?  Yes. But, not malice. The cure for ignorance is more information, which Deborah provides:

I have a severe hearing impairment.  It is very difficult to hear anything.

But instead of the expected the “a-ha” moment, the employee offers her a wheelchair. FAIL!   

I do not expect everyone to be sensitive to every disability. People are just not very good at putting themselves in someone else’s shoes.  But, when someone takes the time to explain their needs to you, take the time to listen and try to help.

Disability Matters.

Scott Mackler was a husband, father and successful neuroscientist when he received perhaps the worst news imaginable. At the age of 40, he could run a marathon in three and a half hours, but it was about that time he discovered he had ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Today, Scott Mackler’s mind is sharp as ever, but his body has failed. Doctors call it “locked in” syndrome. Scott and his wife Lynn learned to communicate with about the only thing he has left, eye movement.To signal “yes,” Lynn says Scott looks at her; to signal “no,” he looks away.

But recently Scott found a new voice. “Can everyone hear the PC?”

You have to see it!

Having a happy Halloween may be especially difficult if you have a special needs child. K. Sayford-Wilson writes about the problems her child has.

Our youngest child has sensory integration problems with developmental delays and also a speech disorder called developmental apraxia. These challenges limit her ability to process information, so the way in which she understands information is different from the way other children would understand information. Telling a typical child that a scary, angry-looking skeleton half-buried in the ground is only plastic might work. Telling a special needs child with sensory integration problems and a speech disorder that it is plastic and will not hurt her - may not make any sense to her. The child may not be able to handle the sensory overload and may just run away (ours did).

…

On Halloween, we avoided all houses with any scary decorations or music - and avoided all people in scary costumes. When our child started whining about “go home,” we honored her request.

If you are thinking of putting up a scary display, please remember that your scary Halloween display can be extra scary for young kids or children with special needs.  

I do not want to tell anyone not to have a fun Halloween, including having a scary Halloween.  There are ways to balance family friendly and scary.

Several of my neighbors handle this by having a “haunted” garage or back yard.  Younger children can trick-or-treat at the front door while older kids can opt-in for the scarier sights and sounds.  

Halloween “tricky” for Phila mom with special needs child.

Here is a story of a doctor living and working in Australia to help with a shortage of doctors, denied permanent residency because his son has down syndrome. 

Bernhard Moeller came to Australia with his family two years ago to help fill a doctor shortage in a rural area of Victoria state.

His temporary work visa is valid until 2010, but his application for permanent residency was rejected this week. The immigration department said Moellers 13-year-old son, Lukas, “did not meet the health requirement.”

“A medical officer of the Commonwealth assessed that his sons existing medical condition was likely to result in a significant and ongoing cost to the Australian community,” a departmental spokesman said in a statement issued Thursday by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship.

I find the story amazing. The country is happy to have the doctor there to treated patients, and to continue living there, along with his son with down syndrome, through at least 2010.

But, they refuse to let the father and son stay in Australia on a permanent basis because of the son’s medical condition.  What do you think?

AFRA_Newshawk : Message: Residency Denied to Disabled Boy - Down Syndrome .

I recently came across this letter on the Letters to the Next President site:

I would like to know about changes in social security-specifically disability. … I worked as an LPN for over 30 years. I started having back, neck and arthritic probelems, and after several years of pain I applie for social security disability. The process was long. It took approximately 2 years from the time I applied untill I was finally approved, and then receive a paycheck. If it had not been for my family helping me financially, I don’t know what I would have done. Isn’t there any way to speed up this process for other people who may desperately need money?

I wish I could say this was the exception, but as most of us know, long wait times are unfortunately the norm in Social Security cases.  

Send your Social Security stories to the president, or leave them in the comments.

Chica, of Conversations in My Head, has a great site discussing her ups and downs (no pun intended) dealing with bi-polar disorder.

My symptoms are constant and unpredictable. There are stretches of time where I find myself uninterested in hobbies, the kids, days where I want to sleep all day and days when I can’t sleep. There are days when I’m on top of the world, where I organize and reorganize the cabinets in my home, only to crash into an irritable and anxiety ridden state. Bipolar affects the way I live and how I breathe. Unlike regular mood swings, my mood swings hit heaven or hell. It affects my activity level, my judgment, and behavior.

Read more here.

My wife feels disabled. She used to teach junior high school Spanish full time for over $60,000 per year. She can no longer work as a full-time teacher, because the stress triggers mania. Believe me, she tried several times to return to teaching, and each time she experienced a serious breakdown.

She did receive some disability payments from the Social Security Administration for several months when she was completely unable to work. Now she’s working as a teaching assistant earning about $15,000 per year.

She can’t do the job she wants to do and was trained to do. She no longer has the same earning potential. That makes her feel disabled, but that’s not how the Social Security Administration sees it.

The article goes through the Social Security disability analysis and is a great review of how disability cases are evaluated.

photo credit: s-t-r-a-n-g-e

CT Blue talks about the often unspoken cost of war: veteran’s coming home with disabilities.

According to a new report from the Pentagaon “1 in 5 American servicemen and women who have been in Iraq are coming back with brain injuries.”. The same report says that “17 percent of the soldiers returning to war could have a traumatic brain injury”.

A lot of vets who apply for veteran’s benefits also apply for social security disability. If the VA makes a finding that a vet is 100% disabled, that finding is not binding on social security.

Although the VA’s rating is not binding on Social Security, Social Security will frequently give significant deference to the VA rating, especially when the VA has assigned an 100% rating.

If you are in this position, hang in there. Even if Social Security does not automatically approve a claim where the individual has a 100% impairment rating from the VA, there is a very good chance that the claim will be eventually approved. However, that may mean that the individual may have to appeal and take the case in front of an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ).

Social Security disability claims with less than 100% VA disability rating are more like non-service related disability claims. That is, you have to obtain medical documentation of the diagnosis, signs and symptoms, and try to get a statement from a treating physician describing the workplace limitations caused by the disability.

Read the entire CT Blue post here.

photo credit: greefus groinks….

Depression isn’t just feeling sad, or discouraged. It is a deeply penetrating darkness. Every fibre of my body feels hopeless. Nothing brings a smile to my face– not my children, not the sun, not a windfall of money, not even Jude Law. I will never feel happy. I have no positive attributes, I am nothing special.

Read the complete article here.  Oops, looks like the blog is not there anymore.

Please note, I am not advocating the “multi-vitamins” which the author says helped her.  However, the author does not appear to be trying to sell these and provides a truly compelling portrait of depression.

 photo credit: Linds K

bishi4me video blogs about her daily life and how she deals with social phobia:

MS can be hard for doctors to diagnose. Its symptoms can include fatigue, pain, cognitive problems like memory loss, weakness, blurred vision, dizziness, and bladder or bowel problems. A person with Multiple Sclerosis will often look just fine. That is why, in the context of a Social Security Disability hearing, it is so important to have an attorney to represent you and demonstrate to the ALJ all objective and subjective evidence that should be put forward. Objective evidence of MS will include MRIs of the Brain and Spine, observations of your treating doctor, and often, results of a spinal tap. Subjective evidence of MS will include many of your activities of daily life and how MS has forced you to make changes.

Read the entire article here.

photo credit: Dazzie D

California Blogging has a story about surviving a four year Social Security Audit(!)

During the audit they inspect every account, every dime I make and spend.   I am allowed some money from some sources. Services from other government or social programs are not counted against Zachary.  Even though it’s immaterial it’s still audited.  Child support is counted against Zachary and people wonder why I don’t really go after his dad?  During the audit if you are missing a receipt for anything, your worker will make up an amount higher than the average number you have shown.

You can read the entire story on story on California Blogging.

If you have a child on Supplemental Security Income, Social Security looks at the entire household income to determine if the child is financially elligible to receive SSI benefits.

In some cases, this means even if the child is disabled, the family cannot receive any SSI benefits because the household income is too high. I have had cases where the parents wait until the child is 18 to apply, because at 18, Social Security only looks at the child’s income (often zero), not the household income.

But even if your household income is not too high at the beginning, you have to regularly prove to Social Security that your income is below the allowed amount. This results in audits.

 photo credit: Phillip