I am on it. I was put on it at around 19, I was resistant at first but I was convinced that it would be better to be on it and not be such a financial burden to my parents. I can make up to 900 a month and continue to receive benefits and I have toyed with that idea but I would have to go through a case review. I think the best thing to do would be to finish my degree and then try to get a real job.
As for how to get it I think it depends on where you live and who you know. My mother had worked for the government and was good friends with a person somehow connected with SSI who basically told her what to expect and all the right things to do, and a few other tricks. One of the things her friend told us that they do in the county we lived in is they always deny your claim the first time because a significant percentage of people give up after the first denial. The evaluation was laughable at least in that state, my mother actually had to explain to them what Aspergers Syndrome is. Once we moved here all that I needed to receive benefits was some documentation proving I received benefits in another state and one sit down with a government psychologist.
I didn't like the idea of free hand outs at first, and I made some of the very same arguments to my liberal socialist mother that I have seen made by others on WP against people with moderate or mild AS receiving SSI. Ultimately I was convinced to go ahead with it. I don't like the idea of being a financial burden on my family and I seriously doubt my situation would be much different today if I hadn't gotten benefits because of my other issues.
SSI allows me to live alone, pay for all of my food and other bills and pay my parents "rent" to live in this house which they own. It will even allow me to finish my degree between the very good financial aid that we have locally and the fact that the state actually allows for the benefits to be used towards education. It also allows me to have better health benefits than I could afford otherwise.
I want to get off of it eventually, and sooner rather than later. I am ashamed of it for one thing, I feel just being on it hampers my social life as eventually people want to know what I do to earn a living and I have a feeling that most people would think less of me for being on it. The amount of money received is just enough to get by on with very little left over to do anything else, let alone do all the things I would like to be able to do. I can forget about dating because of those reasons.
Ultimately I view it as a tool, a temporary solution that is available to me to ease the burden of life, and gives my always hard working and generous parents a break. I feel they deserve a break even if it takes judicious usage of gray areas to give it to them.
05 Sep 2008, 2:21 am
