Indiana Woman Relieved to Hear 'You've Got Your SSDI!'

Obtaining Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) can be a time-consuming and stressful experience. Two out of every three applicants initially are denied. Rosemarie Grimm is not afraid of hard work. Mrs. Grimm’s first job was in the mail room before she found success as a commodity buyer. She followed a path paved with steady work thereafter. But then her health turned a corner and hard times were not far behind. Carpal tunnel syndrome, sciatica, degenerative disc disease and spinal stenosis set in disrupting her ability to work. After witnessing firsthand the trouble her significant other had in receiving SSDI, Mrs. Grimm feared she would never receive her benefits. Luckily for her, Allsup was there to help when all hope seemed lost. Find out how Allsup lifted her spirits.

 

 

 

Goshen, Indiana ─ Rosemarie Grimm never planned on not working, but hard times seemed to follow her.

 

After succeeding in a good job, marriage forced a change with a succession of lower-paying jobs and a couple of moves. These changes and her declining health led her in search of some sort of normalcy, and later a chance to stop and live again on her own terms.

 

Her working life began in an insurance company mail room. From there, Mrs. Grimm, now 50, handled accounts receivable for a book publisher before heading to Saginaw, Mich., to work as a secretary for a roofing installation and gypsum company.

 

She was excited when they promoted her to commodity buyer. “I was in charge of 40 stores,” she said, pride in her accomplishment lending her Midwestern accent a happy cadence. She found love there, too, but lost the good job.

 

“After three years, I moved to Aurora, Ill., because I got married and that is where my husband was based as an air traffic controller,” Mrs. Grimm said. But when the marriage crashed, she took flight, taking short hops to various jobs—some good, some better, one life-shaping.

 

“I was working with homeless people for Catholic Charities,” she said. She formed a new family when she met Sean and they had a son, Justin. She started working as a waitress in nearby Joliet, Ill. The work was steady, tips good, and she stayed there three years. But in 2002, she tore a disc in her lower back, which required steroid injections to relieve the pain.

 

“Our kitchen was the size of a small bathroom,” she recalled of the apartment they lived in. “The building was old, with iron doorknobs, and the fridge was right across from the door. I went to pull open the fridge and Sean opened the door behind me. That iron doorknob hit me hard.”

 

A girlfriend encouraged her to relocate. They moved to Goshen, in Amish country near the Michigan border.

 

After moving, she worked in another restaurant, and then at a speedway and then again at a restaurant. She couldn’t seem to settle, and her life was continually disrupted by pain.

 

The unlucky strike by the doorknob had dislocated a disc in her lower spine. Doctors diagnosed degenerative disc disease. For nine months, she relied on steroid injections for relief that was immediate but gradually faded until she was counting the days to the next injection. Eventually, Medicaid quit paying for treatment. After three failed attempts at work in Goshen, she quit for good.

 

In addition to food stamps, they lived off the Social Security checks that Sean and son Justin received because of his father’s disability. “We went through a lot of hard times,” she said, the sad memories softening her voice.

 

Besides the bad back, she suffered from carpal tunnel syndrome in her wrists, and sciatica that shoots pain down her legs when it strikes. Eventually, spinal stenosis settled in as well. Life for Rosemarie was, indeed, grim.

 

Mrs. Grimm knew she probably qualified for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). Sean had gotten his benefits, although it took him more than a year, and “he’s an amputee. How long will it take me?” she wondered fearfully.

 

But a friend told her about a company called Allsup that had helped her boyfriend get SSDI. She gave them a call.

 

Allsup is a nationwide provider of Social Security disability, Medicare and workers’ compensation services for individuals, employers and insurance carriers. Founded in 1984, Allsup employs more than 600 professionals who deliver specialized services supporting people with disabilities and seniors so they may lead lives that are as financially secure and as healthy as possible.

 

“Allsup was wonderful from day one,” Mrs. Grimm said. “If I asked something they didn’t know, they would get back to me. They always kept me informed. They kept a record of everything we talked about.”

 

Mrs. Grimm knew obtaining SSDI benefits would take a while. In fact, a nationwide backlog of claims has caused massive delays in case consideration and awards, so much so that many applicants wait years for results. She crossed her fingers, hoping Allsup could reduce her waiting time. They did.

 

Allsup accepted Mrs. Grimm as a client in April 2007. Less than two years later, in February 2009, she was awarded benefits and a hefty lump-sum payment as back pay.

 

She was awarded benefits after a hearing with her Allsup senior representative present to argue her case. Mrs. Grimm wasn’t able to get there and it was mandatory that she be there in person.

 

She hit one more possible obstacle on the day of the hearing, when, she couldn’t find transportation. Two hours before the hearing was scheduled to begin in Fort Wayne, Ind., she called her Allsup representative. “No one would drive me there,” she said. “That broke my heart. After almost two years, five hours prior to the hearing, there was nothing I could do.”

 

The Allsup representative said he’d go to the hearing without her and do what he could. Four hours later, he called her back with a brief message: “You’ve got your SSDI.”

 

“It’s like a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders,” Mrs. Grimm said. “I now have a car. I can drive my son to soccer and other sports. I didn’t have the money to do it before. I didn’t have the transportation to take him or have the money for him to play sports.

 

“Because of Allsup, everything changed. They do it all for you,” she said. “They were great. It means everything to me.”