Social Security Banditry

Well, it's been a long time since I last updated, and a lot has happened (well, relatively speaking I guess). To start, the Celexa wasn't working for me, so I got put on Seroquel, which so far seems to help. I've had a lot of stuff piling on top and life dumped a huge load on me yesterday (more on that in a bit), which by all means "should" have sent me into a ginormous panic attack, yet didn't. I do seem to be having some hypo-mania, but because I'm recognizing it I'm able to work around it (or by having my mate make decisions instead of me) it's not as debilitating as full on panic attacks and extreme depression.


To start, over the last few weeks I've had someone bothering me for help with their relationship issues. I obliged, cause I thought I might be able to give some advice, and advice I did give and in spades, as it were. Problem is, advice is only helpful if the person actually listens to it, and tries follow it. Ignoring advice, or going against it, when you admit it's good advice, is a really stupid thing to do; especially when most of the advice is to just have so fucking patience! Patience is not re-asking how long something will take when it was just answered; it is not complaining after five hours when they're told it'll take months. Oh, and it wasn't just a complete dearth of patience, there was also the constant thoughts about how he could "get back" at her, for what he allowed her to do and so she didn't realize he had problems with (in this case seeing someone closer as they're separated by an ocean), or the constant "telling her how it is" when he doesn't have contact with the boyfriend of his ex-girlfriend and so is very clueless as to what is even maybe really going on. Or the complete lack of understanding why she might be having problems with that, or even how any thought process goes or what she means by what she said or, even worse, how she would misunderstand what he meant when he seems completely oblivious to this thing called "punctuation," and grammar is mostly an after-thought when it's there. And yet, for all his troubles using the English language, which is his native language, he claims to be a writer...


Well, things finally came to a close with that cause he bothered me too much about his problems which, quite frankly, are quite petty in comparison to the ones I've been having and then had land on me that morning. Oh, though he didn't really know cause, like always, he didn't even ask me how I was, just went straight into complaining. I yelled at him about it, had my mate take over and yell some more, and then got him blocked so I wouldn't have to deal with his crap. Seriously, I've put up with it for weeks, and he's not actually listened to a single damn thing I said, never care how I was, tried to be chummy so as to draw me into a false sense of camaraderie, and then also had the audacity to be feigning depression (which always just "went away" when he "understood" something) so "extreme" that he felt he was better off dead, perhaps by his own hand. Yeah, total passive aggressive abusive behaviour there. No wonder his girlfriend left. Oh well, now that he's blocked I shouldn't have to deal with him much any more (he still posts at the forums I go to, but he doesn't post much and I can keep that separate).


Speaking of forums, I actually became a moderator at FSTDT.net. I think it's nice cause I'm able to then have what I feel is a greater level of participation and interaction, but primarily it gives a lot more responsibilities. That's why I had actually turned down the offer half a year or more back, as I wasn't sure I'd be able to handle the level of responsibility, but with having meds that are actually working to some degree I believe I'm able to handle it now. This, of course, is now getting tested as I've been having to do a bit in the last couple days. Not a problem in itself, but combined with everything else it still adds to the pile.


Now for the grand finale of what happened yesterday. My mate go a letter in the mail from Social Security. They're claiming they screwed up the calculation of his pay, back in '03, and so now he owes them what they "overpaid" from them, and it totals $22,155. And somehow they think it can be paid in one lump sum within the next couple weeks. Well, they said a month from when we got the letter, and they'd assume we got it 5 days after the date posted on the letterhead, but when we called in today they said a month from the day on the letter. This date happens to say April 19th, so instead of having 30 days from yesterday to handle it, or even until May 24th, we only have until May 19th to get this dealt with; which leaves us with barely over 2 weeks, half the time they said we should have. Oh, this gets even better. They also failed to include the return envelope which they claimed they included for a form they want us fill out and mail in. Also, they're docking his pay by ~$300/mo, which since we've been barely scraping by means we will not be able to make ends meet, no matter how we try to cut costs. Oh, and I'm sure they carefully calculated things too, as with the new amount and my SSDI income, we get $46 over the poverty line, which then of course disqualifies us for other benefits and puts us further in the hole they're doing their best to bury us in.


Well, in the call today we did manage to find out what the "miscalculation" was in relation to. It's apparently because my mate qualifies for Worker's Compensation; and no, they couldn't specify from which job. Course, we're clueless as to what job it could possibly be too, as he's only worked for the USAF (and got honourably discharged from), which would would be something other than Worker's Comp., and one day at a grocery store that was spent in training, before he quite cause he couldn't handle the working conditions. How then can he qualify for Worker's Comp. from anything? And even if he did qualify, how the fuck did they not inform us of this earlier? Also, how did it take them 5 year to catch this, missing it in the yearly payment reviews (mostly to calculate the cost of living increase) and his 3 year reviews for maintaining eligibility for it?


Oh, and just to rub salt into the wound they just made, they said that if we couldn't pay the $22,155 by the deadline, they'd dock it from his pay, which they were going to lower, and that he would then be getting $459/mo starting in June. Well, it's not June in any part of the world yet, and yet they have already cut his pay! We got paid today and, whaddya know, it was only $459, even though we have NOT had any time to even appeal their decision that it should even be cut! I guess they figure they can get away with ripping us off like this, and thereby putting us at too low an income to meet even basic living needs (and we live in a cheap-ass apartment too), as we're both disabled and have problems with paperwork and so are then less likely to successfully raise a stink about this.


Well, I'm damn glad the Seroquel is working, and that I know some people who can hopefully get us help, and even the others I know who are there for us to rant at and get emotional comfort and support from.


This is an outrage. This is possibly illegal what they're doing too, as they're not even going by what they claim is the proper procedure; which means they're either fucking up big time about unjust fees and pay cuts or are guilty of perjury.