I would highly suggest that when you do apply Jennifer that you have stopped working. You don't need to have officially quite but you should be making disability claims. This will help a great deal. If they see you are working they figure you still can even if it's killing you. I quite working in June 08 and applied immediately. I heard by end of Aug. 08 that I was approved. I did not back file so when I started getting checks it was from that day forward due to the 5-6 month blackout timeframe.
In terms of how I filed. I applied online. I got a call to answer some questions and set up an interview. I declined being able to go in for an in-person interview and set up a phone interview (remember cfers look healthy and this won't help our case at all). I completed the phone interview a few days later and then they sent me a transcript of it and all looked good. Then they asked me to fill out a form about my ADL abilities and such. I answered the questions truthfully as though it was my worst day. I incl. a "day in the life" timeline of what my average 24 hr's included. This was one of the questions on the form and the only one I didn't answer hand-written in the space provided. Remember these people look at milllions of pcs of paperwork. The more you can spell it out very plainly the better. I also incl. a spreadsheet that dated each exacerbation, hospitalization, dr. intervention, and antibiotic (inhaled) usage. Again I made it very straight forward. It clearly showed how I qualified through their impairment listing. I did not incl. any emotional bs except noting things like that I have to get dressed after my pt because I often urinate on myself during the treatments. Again factual, sad, but not stated in a whiny poo manner.
Although they said I didn't need to send records that they'd get them from my doctors I reviewed all my medical records from the previous year and cherry picked only the ones that fit the story I was building (ie proving dates of admission, visits, pharamacy records, etc.). Not incl. any that said stuff like "Lauren looks great today" or similar. It was a small stack. Do not send any more info than one year. THEY DO NOT WANT TO HEAR YOUR LIFE STORY. For this reason I would wait to apply when you have a 12 month period that is especially BAD. They only care about the year prior to application. I would say the only exception is if you are claiming for back pay for previous years would they want to see those records.
Ask your doctor not to send the records that you will take care of it but to rather write a convincing letter of medical necessity. Beth Suffian wrote a template that your doc should have in his/her binder from the CFF It's a great starting point. Your doctor has to be on board with you not being able to work and needs to document the impairments you meet. If you can incl. this letter with the other documents. I assume that it helped my cause that everything arrived in one envelope. Neatly organized with no reason to delay. Because I took it all on myself I took a little longer to get them everything. I was surprised when they called me saying they hadn't received the medical records. I even had to ask for another 2 weeks and I still got accepted fast.
After sending in the envelope I waited for 6-8 weeks. One day I received a letter that I would be receiving benefits. When I looked in my bank acct they had already made the deposit. Cha-ching!
Oh and by the way I contacted Beth to see if I should go through her and she said that I should apply and then get her help to appeal if I was declined.
I'll be re-evaluated in 3 years.
If anyone has any questions please feel free to PM me. Also Julie was helpful with advice and generally encouraging of me going for it. I thought I wasn't sick enough.
Good luck!
