Don’t Allow SSA To Get You Down ~ You Are Not Your Disease/Disorder 

I remember in late 2014-2015 applying for disability it was a humiliating  process for me.I heard it could take a few months to years to be awarded federal disability benefits, but I would probably have to be literally dying to get anything 

I mean that’s the kind of luck I have. 

I read how people have to jump almost through fire in fact many people trudge through two to five years of endless forms, initial decisions, appeals, reconsiderations and hearings before becoming card-carrying members of the unofficial federal disability club if they’re successful.
In kind terms, the Social Security Administration (SSA) drags its feet more for those who are younger, more educated and healthier-looking. Seems pretty unfair because many people are ill and don’t look sick. 
The SSA is less likely to award disability to those who have worked recently or, ironically, to those who have worked fewer years. 
Additionally, the lesser known or more abstract the disability as well as the more physical (as opposed to mental), the less willing the SSA is to acknowledge a disability. 
These are facts I was  told by an attorney’s office.
As if I hadn’t already made the most difficult decision of my life to accept my inability to work, applying for disability takes it one step further, forcing me to accept every single thing I can no longer do, even those things I am just not ready to accept. 
I still have dreams of being healthy, returning to work some day, & hiking again with my husband not a mini hike I’m talking hours and wanted to to run a 5 k so please don’t take what’s left away from me too.
My reality was muted by the towering, sound proof piles of paperwork.Needed for the SSA and my attorney. 
I was told that my new job is to prove to the Social Security Administration that I am unable to work, but also that I can no longer function as independently as I once did.
I have to prove I no longer have a life despite all I have done to maintain the appearance of living. 
I have to fully believe my inabilities enough to prove them true to strangers. I have to believe I’m less than I ever imagined I would be so others will believe me.
The piles of paperwork littered my dining room table as I struggled to answer questions about my (in)ability to take care of my health and accomplish all my household chores. 

I feel I am exaggerating when I say I cannot clean my home, like before, even though as I write the answer i can see my ceiling fans getting dusty. And my walls would have been washed by now That drives me crazy. Also my blinds are getting dusty. But I can’t climb a ladder anymore.

Who would think I would miss scrubbing my walls.  
I feel I am exaggerating when I say I used-to dust every day but can’t anymore, but I’m looking at how spotless everything is except areas that are 6 inches from the floor and the baseboard area.
Saying I can’t work is easy. 

I know I am disabled and cannot work, I have tried to work when I was first diagnosed , I went home feeling like I was never going to make it through the work week. I haven’t given up hope I haven’t forgotten the joy of spending an evening out with friends, or a day trip to the park, I haven’t forgotten the freedom and power of hiking a few miles. I haven’t forgotten, and that is what keeps me from accepting the losses I never imagined were possible.
I remember how whole I felt before, and now I am left with just broken pieces ,pieces I hold onto so dearly, like a broken vase 

I have learned, by looking at myself through the eyes of the Social Security Administration, that I am nothing more than my disease and I hate that !

I am now defined by everything I have lost.

Time and time again, I am painfully reminded that having a life outside my disability is simply unacceptable.

If I need disability benefits, I had better be able to prove I am worthy of occupying the lowest rung of the ladder in a bureaucratic nation of bullshit 
But I won’t give up. While this process is taking everything I have, I will not give up. Because people with any form of disability don’t give up. We don’t have the option.
So as you all struggle to get your SSD know you are not your disease or disorder.
Don’t let what the government wants to label you as define you
You are great you are one of a kind you have and will have hopes and dreams 
Wrote about this in 2014-2015 
And I did get my disability it took less than a year. So I guess my Osteonecrosis was worse that even I thought.
But know know you can do things to help yourself. 
Eat healthy 

Walk if you can

Ride a bike if you can

Even if it’s 10 minutes 2-3 x a day 

Move  keep that body somehow moving 

And know there is a light at the end of the tunnel 

And hope is always there.