Obtaining
Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) can be a time-consuming and stressful experience. Two out of every three applicants initially are denied. A series of seizures put an end to Virginia Henson’s working days. Read how Allsup took care of everything for Mrs. Henson.
* This is a true story as told to Allsup.
Unsure where to turn for help, she received a tip that changed her life.
Allsup Comes Through for Tennessee Woman Sidelined by Epilepsy
By Chris Birk
Lebanon, Tennessee — Hard work was always a part of Virginia Henson’s life.
Her first job was at a nursing home in her Tennessee hometown. She spent the summer before her senior year of high school caring for patients, which often involved lifting them from beds or wheelchairs.
Soon after graduating, she took a similar job as a nurse’s aide at a hospital in nearby Franklin, Ky. She was promoted to ward clerk, but the strain of helping patients in and out of bed took a toll on her body.
Mrs. Henson was happy to leave the heavy lifting behind. She married at 22 and spent the next few years working at a grocery store before moving to Germany with her husband, who was in the Army.
She loved the time abroad, but her husband returned home and was stationed at Fort Belvoir in Virginia. The failing health of her mother eventually brought Mrs. Henson back to Tennessee. Mrs. Henson and her brother cared for their mother who was battling lupus, a chronic disease that affects the immune system.
Her mother eventually lost the fight. In the wake of her mother’s death, Mrs. Henson decided to seek new work and took a job in the distribution center of a national restaurant chain.
She started on an assembly line and worked her way from the shipping department to franchisee customer service, where she coordinated schedules and tackled logistical needs for the company’s nearly 600 locations.
After a series of false starts, Mrs. Henson finally found a job with staying power. She liked the company’s family oriented atmosphere and enjoyed the work.
Unfortunately, her health wouldn’t cooperate.
Mrs. Henson was at home with her husband in 2004 when she suddenly blacked out. She awoke on an ambulance backboard on the way to the hospital. Doctors told her she had suffered a grand mal seizure, which features violent muscle contractions and a loss of consciousness.
There were no previous symptoms or signs. “You don’t know anything,” Mrs. Henson said. “When you wake up, you’re disoriented for a few minutes. My husband didn’t know what was going on.”
Epilepsy is the most common cause of grand mal seizures, but physicians generally look for at least two unprovoked seizures before rendering a diagnosis. The disorder is characterized by surges in electrical signals in the brain.
Mrs. Henson returned to work within a couple days. But a few months later she suffered a second grand mal seizure during her lunch break in the company cafeteria and was officially diagnosed with epilepsy.
Doctors put her on anti-seizure medication. She returned to what she felt was a more hostile environment at work. After a year in the crosshairs, Mrs. Henson quit in 2005.
She spent the next few years working sporadically in a local school cafeteria. But between the seizures, high blood pressure, a bulging disc as well as complications from Type 2 and Type 3 diabetes, Mrs. Henson knew her working days were coming to a close. A terrible fall that landed Mrs. Henson flat on her back on a concrete floor complicated her life even more.
She just wasn’t sure what to do. Then, in spring 2010, she struck up a conversation with a woman at her brother’s 50th birthday party. Mrs. Henson shared some of her story, and the woman suggested she file for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits, a federal insurance program that provides monthly benefits to people under full retirement age (65 or older) who can no longer work because of a disability.
The woman provided an extra bit of advice: She suggested that Mrs. Henson call Allsup, the nation’s premier SSDI representation company, which had helped secure her benefits. Founded in 1984, the Illinois-based firm has helped more than 170,000 people across the country receive the SSDI benefits they paid for throughout their working lives.
Mrs. Henson took her advice and contacted Allsup. The company took her case in March 2010. Allsup gathered medical documents and other critical paperwork. Mrs. Henson visited doctors to get updated assessments.
The Social Security Administration (SSA) denied her initial application and rejected a
disability appeal. Allsup representatives redoubled their efforts and added even more depth to an already comprehensive file.
The company’s dedication paid off in May 2011 when an administrative law judge awarded Mrs. Henson’s
Social Security disability benefits based on her thoroughly developed application. “I was so glad,” she said. “Now we can have a little more comfort in [paying] our bills and our everyday living.”
Mrs. Henson said she would have been lost without Allsup and that timely recommendation.
“I didn’t know where to go or what to do,” she said. “Allsup took care of all this for me. They were fantastic.”