Obtaining
Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) can be a time-consuming and stressful experience. Two out of every three applicants initially are denied. Epileptic seizures could not keep her down, but they eventually put an end to Carrie Wood’s long work history. Without a way to pay her bills, the mounting stress caused her seizures to get worse. Read how Allsup helped to alleviate her financial strain.
* This is a true story as told to Allsup.
Her longtime doctor recommended Allsup, a move that changed her life.
Financial Worker with Epilepsy Didn’t Know Where to Turn
By Barbara Isaacs Renfro
Westland, Michigan —Carrie Wood has lived with occasional severe epileptic seizures for 30 years, ever since she was 11 years old. Though it was sometimes a struggle, she was proud to keep working. “I’d worked ever since I was 15 years old,” she said.
But things changed in 2010, when she suddenly began having frequent grand mal seizures, also known as tonic-clonic seizures, which cause complete loss of consciousness and strong, uncontrollable muscle contractions.
Because the seizures arrive with little or no warning, it is common for Ms. Wood to be injured during an episode. Once, at her medical billing job at an ambulance service, a seizure caused her to strike her face violently on a cubicle wall, giving her two black eyes. “My co-workers were terrified,” Ms. Wood remembered. Normally, there are emergency medical technicians in the office, but they were out on an ambulance run.
She has bitten her tongue more times than she can count, and has gotten scraped in the shower during a seizure. Also, people do not immediately return to normal after a seizure. People with seizure disorder, including Ms. Wood, feel exhausted for at least several hours, and sometimes for up to two days, after a seizure. “All I would want to do is sleep after one,” she said. “And sometimes there would be a migraine.”
For much of her life, she had gone months or longer without any major seizure activity. But last year the seizures became larger and more violent. Worst of all, they struck up to three times per week.
At that time Ms. Wood, 41, was under a great deal of stress. She was out of work and facing bankruptcy, after a long career in accounting for a manufacturing businesses and then in medical billing for the ambulance service. “I couldn’t find a job,” Ms. Wood said. “I wasn’t allowed to drive anymore and it was hard to look for a job.” She also was dealing with stress in her personal life, including caring for her young grandson.
Once again, Ms. Wood began seeing her childhood neurologist who was concerned about Ms. Wood’s lack of health insurance and her limited ability to pay for crucial anti-seizure medication. “She thought it would be best if I applied for disability,” Ms. Wood said. “And she recommended Allsup. She had a patient who had used Allsup successfully and had been referring similar patients to them.”
Ms. Wood had never heard of Allsup, but she trusted her longtime physician’s advice. When she contacted the company, she immediately felt she was in expert hands.
Within just seven months, Allsup guided her through the entire SSDI process from start to finish and helped her get much-deserved benefits. She is one of more than 170,000 people who have received Social Security disability benefits through Allsup, the nation’s leading non-attorney
SSDI representation company.
Like the vast majority of applicants, Ms. Wood was at first denied SSDI, but her Allsup representative reassured her that her case was worthy. If needed, it would be heard before an administrative law judge. It was a huge relief for Ms. Wood when Allsup handled the case without the need for her to appear at a hearing. “I don’t do well with judges,” Ms. Wood said with a chuckle. “I was scared to death.”
During the year that she had no income, Ms. Wood’s father moved in with her to help her with her bills. The risk of losing her house worried her very much. “But we stayed afloat,” she said. Now that the financial stress has lifted, Ms. Wood’s seizures have decreased to smaller seizures once or twice a month. “My neurologist felt it really had a lot to do with stress,” she said of the increase in seizure activity.
Ms. Wood said she can’t say enough good things about Allsup. She’s even told her former husband about the company’s work—he is suffering from severe arterial problems in one of his legs and may be facing amputation. “I’ve tried to tell him he really needs to call,” she said. “I told him: ‘When you find out you need help, call them.’ ”
For now, Ms. Wood is trying her best to adjust to her new life, without going to a job every day. “I still get up like I’m going to work,” she said. Her transition has been a bit tougher because, other than the seizures, her health is normal and she can go about a daily routine, except for being able to drive. “I’m just trying to adapt,” she said. “But knowing I can pay my bills is a huge relief.”