Hello Darling Ones,

Today was the big meeting with my Social Security Disability lawyer. It was an appointment I’ve anticipated for ages. I’ve spent a lot time imagining how it would go and making a case for why I should qualify for disability.

Seriously, I wasted hours upon hours searching for the best way to describe the feeling inside my head, the distorted vision, and the right-side fuckery.

Good thing too, because the call lasted exactly six minutes and I probably said 100 words other than yes (seeing neurologist & retina specialist since June 2025) and no (to medication side effects).

He asked me why I was unable to work and I explained how the macular edema distorts my vision so that I lose letters and punctuation when reading.

“That’s important in your work,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said. “It is.”
“Well, we have what we need,” he said. “I’ll call and get you ready a few days before you hearing in April.”

That was it.

Six minutes.

I was prepared to talk about the distortion in great detail. I was going to explain how I used my giant TV as a computer monitor for a few weeks but the letters were just BIG & distorted and no easier to read. There was an entire soliloquy about sans-serif vs serif fonts and the difficulties each presented, an ode to the importance of quotation marks in HTML.

So now I’m even more curious what he’ll say in the hearing and how it will differ from the case I laid out in my disability application. Twice. It ought to be super compelling. Otherwise why would the government require most disability cases get to the hearing stage where you need representation? It wouldn’t possibly be so people lose hope and give up, right?

I love government bureaucracy.

Hoop jumpingly yours,
Jodi