Shadow Puppet Storyteller

Waking with a Start that's a Stop

I woke with a thought that I couldn't shake -- I may have to apply for disability. I have a broadcast clip from an interview seven months ago in which I genuinely state my love for work. It is more than irritating to realize the compromise to my core beliefs that has to occur so money that I've allowed to be put aside from the time I first worked at sixteen can be used to assist me now. The reason it suddenly came to me in this way, waking with a start, is in equating my spouses' limbo state in relation to disability.

It has taken several moves and several extended times of being at home (whether I've been working or unemployed in that stay) to see and, honestly, to accept the daily struggle he has with depression. Specifically, these last couple of months clarify it for me even more, since I know I too have felt the strongest effects of depression I've ever oin f myself. So, the reason getting disability for the effects of depression is so difficult is threefold, and certainly unhelpful for the person seeking the security their work-life might have allowed. To get the benefit, you have to have enough current "credits" as a worker. If you haven't worked lately, (and I forget the amount of time the credits would equate to), but as an example, my spouse did Lyft for just under a year (now about 2 full years ago) and that's insufficient. Of course, it would also cast doubt on a disability claim, as the work is also evidence of capability to work. The driving stopped as soon as our vehicle became damaged through the fault of a young driver who had no insurance coverage, and Lyft has certain standards for the look of a vehicle. We didn't have the ability to fix it ourselves, and cyclie-out of-control-speaking, my spouse didn't have it in him to continue. Depression takes something that takes a bit of effort and makes it something insurmountable.

So, that's one small example. And this morning's realization is that I'm not getting any response from my attempts to reopen my unemployment claim. Within one week, I may have to open a new claim, because the earlier one expires and the EDD will have to recalculate the payment from the newer employer. In the meantime, this is making me see that my inability to find some other place to work is being impacted by my own sense for not being good enough, and in trying to face the struggle I am having to walk about for any amount of time. On a scale of walking differently all my life, there was never a level one (not looking disabled), and right now I'd put myself at about seven in relation to working for an employer fulltime.

I may just be better served, whether it goes against my grain or not, to make the disability claim instead of the unemployed claim while I have current employment credits. That's the piece of it I realized this morning. If you are reading this and do not know me well, I have only been a recipient of unemployment three times within thirty plus years of working. I'm not sure why I'm predisposed to justify it in some manner, but the yahoos who fight and moan about Socialist or laughably Communist leanings in American social programs do get plenty of airtime on Fox News. So, gunshy yes, agree with the under educated, no.

How disabled do I have to be, and how does this affect my ability to survive into old age? These are the questions I refuse to face while I am busy working, And sadly, my spouse, a great father-figure, who took on home responsibilities (Mr. Mom) and make them secure in important ways that I couldn't always; shows our kids how they are so well-loved...I have the reminder of today's calendar-stated purpose to proclaim that Fatherhood really has nothing to do with supplying an income, and I love how he's done Fatherhood.