Filing for Social Security Disability — Online!

In the Federal Civil Service, we have this little Catch-22.  If you file for Disability Retirement from the government, you have to prove you’ve filed for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) before your retirement request can be approved by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).  However, SSDI tends to cast a jaundiced eye on filings made by people who are still (technically) working.

But soft!  We have a FORM for that.  We call it the FEDMER.  “Federal Medical Evidence of Record”.

Ya fills it out after you go through the tedious online process of filing for SSDI.  Then you send it back to your HR office… and wait.  This proves that “I have filled for Social Security disability benefits, but I have not received a decision.  I will provide my Human Resource office with proof (e.g., copy of Social Security disability application receipt…)”

When My Retirement Goes Through, What Will I Do?

At the moment, I find myself waiting on two doctors to come through with the paperwork I need to officially file my applications for disability retirement.  I’m guessing that once the paperwork is filed, it’ll take at least a month to get through the NIH, then another several months to make its inexorable way through the Office of Personnel Management.  Then they will come up with a retirement date.  And I’ll be retired.

What are my plans?

I plan to get in contact with as many Parkinson’s advocate groups as possible and offer my services as a speaker.  I’m still loud, although slurry and stuttery.  And I’m still a decent writer.

I am going to try my level best, using whatever energy I have left for however long I have to raise awareness about Parkinson’s disease, and to raise money to fund the research.