VA Compensation Takes Time                                     (Continued from Page 2) Please understand that being able to stand up for five minutes, doesn’t necessarily mean that I can stand up for ten minutes, or an hour. It’s quite likely that doing those five minutes has exhausted my resources and Ill need to recover - imagine an athlete after a race. They couldn’t repeat that feat right away either.                  Please repeat the above paragraph substituting, sitting up, walking, thinking, being sociable and so on it applies to everything that I do.             Please understand that if I say I have to sit down/lie down/take these pills now, that I do have to do it right now - it can’t be put off or forget just because I’m doing something else more exciting. Disabilities do not forgive their victims easily.                                     Please understand that I can’t spend all of my energy trying to get well from my chronic disability. With a short-term illness like the flu, you can afford to put life on hold for a week or two while you get well. But an important part of having a chronic disability is coming to the realization that you have to spend energy on having a life while you’re disabled. This doesn’t mean I’m not trying to get better. It doesn’t mean I’ve given up. It’s just how life is when you’re dealing with a chronic disability.                               With as much pain that I go through every day, my body or mind turns it off trying to make myself feel better. When I wake up in the morning at 1:30am and 3:00 am due to pain, again around 4:00 am, again about 5:30 am and finally I just get up due to the pain being so bad. The most sleep that I get at any one time is about 2 hours due to pain in my shoulders, hips, legs and my back. If you will look at my original claim again from 1994 it shows that I complained about a right hip condition. Yes I finally had something awarded for that in a partial judgment on this claim in January 2009. What happened to the previous 16 years when I originally complained about it? Also, since putting in this claim I have had two MRIs completed on my left and right shoulders which also was a complaint on my original claim. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |Next>> [ Back ] [ Tell Your Compensation Story ]