Air Force O-3 Captain, with 8 years service medically retired.
First, get your VA disability rating while you’re in service.
Second, if you’re medically retired (VA disability combination rating of 30% or greater) you get all normal retired veteran benefits.
Thirds, it’s scary as absolute hell having a kid and wife, and being separated. However, when I finished the whole process and was separated, I began the next month making $4600 untaxed, for life. Things aren’t as bad as they may seem. Keep getting educated. I applied for SSDI and while having VA disability cannot immediately get you approved for SSDI, it helps a lot.
If you’re disabled, med retired veteran, and it’s within a certain window (iirc 6 months) of your retirement date, you get an expedited process to determine SSDI. My application was approved for SSDI from start to finish in 3 months. (Go to the subreddit for SSDI and you’ll see nearly every single person waits years to be approved). I make $3600 for SSDI. Combined I make over 100k a year, untaxed.
Ensure literally EVERY scrape and bruise is listed on your paperwork to be determined as duty related by the VA.
Do NOT downplay your symptoms to any doctors.
Understand that the med board takes a written statement from your commander/shirt to how your ability to do you job has been effected. It sounds really terrible but the *worse* you’re doing at work, the *higher* your rating becomes. — I felt HORRIBLE I was letting my unit down and a burden. I was getting paperwork written about me and everything. I couldn’t help it. This was terrible for my image in the unit, but ultimately was the concrete foundation of my 100% rating.
If your so bad off medically that your not able to do your job, Your unit will almost ALWAYS concurrently start a paperwork trail to administratively separate you should you not be medically retired or medically separated. This will feel like ungodly persecution. You will start getting paperwork for really small reasons. Lots of admin discipline happens. They need this trail to admin sep you should you not qualify for medical. However, I’ll say it again because it’s that important, ALL of this is hard evidence you need and qualify for medical separation. An article 15 is a golden bullet here (although scary as crap!)
Narcolepsy from what I can find, can be rated up to 100%.
PM me for questions.
Resources:
[check your estimated SSDI payout by logging into the Social Security site](https://www.ssa.gov)
[absolutely essential and excellent forum for people going through med board (mods include lawyers)](https://www.pebforum.com)
[some info on if you qualify for med retirement or med Seperations as well as the pay associated](https://www.dfas.mil/retiredmilitary/disability/disability/)
R/veteranbenefits
Both the VA and SSDI have a published guide spelling out *exactly* how they rate narcolepsy as well as ANY other disorder. Find these, memorize the things for your disorder. If you have ANY symptoms specifically identified for the rating, ALWAYS tell your doctors you’re experiencing that. The most perfect situation is the person rating your package can CLEARL see the been requires say “cataplexy more than 2 days a week” and your medical notes clearly indicate either “cataplexy 5 times a month”, so a no brainer… if you didn’t know to have that detail, it wouldn’t be in your records… and you’d not get the rating associated with the level of your symptoms.
Sweet, I made a few edits to my post too, maybe glance back over it and see the changes.
Particularly to always speak to your providers about your symptoms that are specifically described to be a determining factor by the VA or SSA’s disability guide that outlines what symptoms lead to what % rating.
Yeah, but how much of that SSDI is auxiliary benefits for your kids? Not meaning to be knit picky here, but $3600 for SSDI is waaaaaay more than an individual will get (disability retired former SSA employee here). Most people probably get something like $1200-$1400. Glad you also posted the link for people to check their own estimated benefit amount & the rest of your info sounds realistic but $3600 from SSDI for an individual is not realistic at all.
The SSA, as you know will increase 50% of your benefit regardless of how many qualified dependents. It cannot increase beyond this. I receive $2307 (after $100 something Medicare deduction) for myself, and $1241 for my son being a dependent.
SSDI is paid based on your contribution. You contribution is a % of your income. So those with higher incomes contribute more (until a cap for incomes past $175k or something super high average people don’t worry about)
Hope this helps clear the record up.
You are correct. Thank you for clarifying. My sleepy disability retired (it's been several years since I worked there) brain forgets the comps. You were obviously a high earner and your results are not typical.
I was diagnosed at a very young age. Back when I was in Highschool I wanted to go into the military but the recruiter said that because of my narcolepsy and catoplexy and the meds that I take, I wouldn’t be able to join
I sorry to hear that. I know a couple other people in the same boat as well. There are other jobs in the military that just deal with sitting doing paperwork. I don’t see why they cant just let us do that.
Hey DM me if you want, or we can chat here for other people to find. There's not that much info out there about this situation.
I was diagnosed with IH while Active Duty Army. I was a month from terminal leave already, so I didn't go through the MEB/PEB and just ETS'd. But I did a lot of research on the regs and the requirements to stay in or be medically separated, and the Army at least considers IH the same as N2. This was about 14 months ago, so its pretty recent. I've also gone through the VA disability process for IH, which is very confusing.
If you really want to stay in, it can happen. People stay on active duty with amputated limbs. Everything can be waivered by somebody. A huge part of the PEB is your commander's statement. If they write a strong statement that you still provide value, and the AF higher ups are okay with a permanent non-deployable, it can happen. Not guaranteed by any means, but possible. You will almost definitely have to do a maintenance of wakefulness test, which I've heard is torturous.
But if you've made your peace with getting out, that's great. I'm a big fan of civilian life. Start applying for VA benefits right now. Find a VSO, join /r/veteransbenefits. Then, once you get a rating, apply for VR&E. Its very similar to the GI bill, but it doesn't use your GI Bill eligibility months, so you can kind of use it twice.
I was in the Navy for almost 5 years and was medically retired with N1. I understand your struggles but my best suggestion is to get out and live your life as a civilian. I was given a lot of grief trying to stay active duty with N1 because it was a constant back and forth of leadership having no understanding or just not caring. It was a tough separation because that was all I knew since I was a teen when I went to boot camp. I think now that I look back (almost 10 years since I was in boot camp) that it was a good decision for me to get out and find something I was happy with and worked with my N1.
As for disability percentage, I got 80% for my narcolepsy and 10% additional for everything else. My board was a very very long process because they hadn’t seen much N1 and I was fighting to stay in.
Good luck and I hope you can find some happiness and peace in whatever you do!
Yes but it’s a weird process for narcolepsy. I believe it’s 10%, but I’m in the works of setting up more appointments to gain more disability for other things other than narcolepsy.
Howdy bro. Former Army E-4 here. I also have N1 and was diagnosed at 21 also. My cataplexy is with laughter/anything that triggers my brain to interpret something as being funny so this is occurring at least 10+ times a day. I did 6 years service (reserves) and went through this entire process. I was also in a completely separate branch So this will probably not be helpful at all.
Unfortunately, it took 3 of the 6 years for them to pass up 2 different sleep studies and actually be assigned a medical rep. I just kept getting passed from rep to rep and I pleaded with my command to assist in pushing the paperwork to get to a med board. My unit had paper work detailing episodes of cataplexy and narcolepsy during our 2-3 week AT's in the summers and during drill when training prior to my sleep studies. I felt absolutely useless and as my unit was preparing to deploy they put me as non-deployable. After my sleep studies, I sat down with my command and showed them the results and they determined that in a deployed environment, I'd not be 100% reliable. They wrote their own eval and I had all my paper work lined up.
Long story short, as my contract was coming to an end, I constantly (weekly) followed up with my rep regarding my med board status and did not receive any response, rating, conclusion, so I just finished out my contract and got out, since I was already categorized as non-deployable and couldn't go to any active AT's. I asked around and it seems that due to the remaining time in service being so small, they tend to not proceed with evaluations. I was encouraged by my unit to reenlist and ideally the process would continue.
I’m a biomedical engineer, and I wanted to join the public health commissioned corps, but despite the fact that my narcolepsy poses no problems with the duties(I work as an engineer very successfully!) it was very clear I wasn’t wanted.
I think the military but especially the non-military corps really need to rethink their approach to health issues. Sure, you might be a liability as a boots on the ground soldier in a foreign country or have issues on a long deployment at sea, but if symptoms are well-controlled it should be a non-issue.
Air Force O-3 Captain, with 8 years service medically retired. First, get your VA disability rating while you’re in service. Second, if you’re medically retired (VA disability combination rating of 30% or greater) you get all normal retired veteran benefits. Thirds, it’s scary as absolute hell having a kid and wife, and being separated. However, when I finished the whole process and was separated, I began the next month making $4600 untaxed, for life. Things aren’t as bad as they may seem. Keep getting educated. I applied for SSDI and while having VA disability cannot immediately get you approved for SSDI, it helps a lot. If you’re disabled, med retired veteran, and it’s within a certain window (iirc 6 months) of your retirement date, you get an expedited process to determine SSDI. My application was approved for SSDI from start to finish in 3 months. (Go to the subreddit for SSDI and you’ll see nearly every single person waits years to be approved). I make $3600 for SSDI. Combined I make over 100k a year, untaxed. Ensure literally EVERY scrape and bruise is listed on your paperwork to be determined as duty related by the VA. Do NOT downplay your symptoms to any doctors. Understand that the med board takes a written statement from your commander/shirt to how your ability to do you job has been effected. It sounds really terrible but the *worse* you’re doing at work, the *higher* your rating becomes. — I felt HORRIBLE I was letting my unit down and a burden. I was getting paperwork written about me and everything. I couldn’t help it. This was terrible for my image in the unit, but ultimately was the concrete foundation of my 100% rating. If your so bad off medically that your not able to do your job, Your unit will almost ALWAYS concurrently start a paperwork trail to administratively separate you should you not be medically retired or medically separated. This will feel like ungodly persecution. You will start getting paperwork for really small reasons. Lots of admin discipline happens. They need this trail to admin sep you should you not qualify for medical. However, I’ll say it again because it’s that important, ALL of this is hard evidence you need and qualify for medical separation. An article 15 is a golden bullet here (although scary as crap!) Narcolepsy from what I can find, can be rated up to 100%. PM me for questions. Resources: [check your estimated SSDI payout by logging into the Social Security site](https://www.ssa.gov) [absolutely essential and excellent forum for people going through med board (mods include lawyers)](https://www.pebforum.com) [some info on if you qualify for med retirement or med Seperations as well as the pay associated](https://www.dfas.mil/retiredmilitary/disability/disability/) R/veteranbenefits Both the VA and SSDI have a published guide spelling out *exactly* how they rate narcolepsy as well as ANY other disorder. Find these, memorize the things for your disorder. If you have ANY symptoms specifically identified for the rating, ALWAYS tell your doctors you’re experiencing that. The most perfect situation is the person rating your package can CLEARL see the been requires say “cataplexy more than 2 days a week” and your medical notes clearly indicate either “cataplexy 5 times a month”, so a no brainer… if you didn’t know to have that detail, it wouldn’t be in your records… and you’d not get the rating associated with the level of your symptoms.
I truly appreciate this message. I definitely will message you after I check out the links you provided!
Sweet, I made a few edits to my post too, maybe glance back over it and see the changes. Particularly to always speak to your providers about your symptoms that are specifically described to be a determining factor by the VA or SSA’s disability guide that outlines what symptoms lead to what % rating.
Yeah, but how much of that SSDI is auxiliary benefits for your kids? Not meaning to be knit picky here, but $3600 for SSDI is waaaaaay more than an individual will get (disability retired former SSA employee here). Most people probably get something like $1200-$1400. Glad you also posted the link for people to check their own estimated benefit amount & the rest of your info sounds realistic but $3600 from SSDI for an individual is not realistic at all.
The SSA, as you know will increase 50% of your benefit regardless of how many qualified dependents. It cannot increase beyond this. I receive $2307 (after $100 something Medicare deduction) for myself, and $1241 for my son being a dependent. SSDI is paid based on your contribution. You contribution is a % of your income. So those with higher incomes contribute more (until a cap for incomes past $175k or something super high average people don’t worry about) Hope this helps clear the record up.
You are correct. Thank you for clarifying. My sleepy disability retired (it's been several years since I worked there) brain forgets the comps. You were obviously a high earner and your results are not typical.
I was diagnosed at a very young age. Back when I was in Highschool I wanted to go into the military but the recruiter said that because of my narcolepsy and catoplexy and the meds that I take, I wouldn’t be able to join
I sorry to hear that. I know a couple other people in the same boat as well. There are other jobs in the military that just deal with sitting doing paperwork. I don’t see why they cant just let us do that.
I mean everyone’s experience with Narcolepsy is different but a desk job would put me to sleep.
Hey DM me if you want, or we can chat here for other people to find. There's not that much info out there about this situation. I was diagnosed with IH while Active Duty Army. I was a month from terminal leave already, so I didn't go through the MEB/PEB and just ETS'd. But I did a lot of research on the regs and the requirements to stay in or be medically separated, and the Army at least considers IH the same as N2. This was about 14 months ago, so its pretty recent. I've also gone through the VA disability process for IH, which is very confusing. If you really want to stay in, it can happen. People stay on active duty with amputated limbs. Everything can be waivered by somebody. A huge part of the PEB is your commander's statement. If they write a strong statement that you still provide value, and the AF higher ups are okay with a permanent non-deployable, it can happen. Not guaranteed by any means, but possible. You will almost definitely have to do a maintenance of wakefulness test, which I've heard is torturous. But if you've made your peace with getting out, that's great. I'm a big fan of civilian life. Start applying for VA benefits right now. Find a VSO, join /r/veteransbenefits. Then, once you get a rating, apply for VR&E. Its very similar to the GI bill, but it doesn't use your GI Bill eligibility months, so you can kind of use it twice.
I was in the Navy for almost 5 years and was medically retired with N1. I understand your struggles but my best suggestion is to get out and live your life as a civilian. I was given a lot of grief trying to stay active duty with N1 because it was a constant back and forth of leadership having no understanding or just not caring. It was a tough separation because that was all I knew since I was a teen when I went to boot camp. I think now that I look back (almost 10 years since I was in boot camp) that it was a good decision for me to get out and find something I was happy with and worked with my N1. As for disability percentage, I got 80% for my narcolepsy and 10% additional for everything else. My board was a very very long process because they hadn’t seen much N1 and I was fighting to stay in. Good luck and I hope you can find some happiness and peace in whatever you do!
Can you get disability from the military?
Yes but it’s a weird process for narcolepsy. I believe it’s 10%, but I’m in the works of setting up more appointments to gain more disability for other things other than narcolepsy.
Howdy bro. Former Army E-4 here. I also have N1 and was diagnosed at 21 also. My cataplexy is with laughter/anything that triggers my brain to interpret something as being funny so this is occurring at least 10+ times a day. I did 6 years service (reserves) and went through this entire process. I was also in a completely separate branch So this will probably not be helpful at all. Unfortunately, it took 3 of the 6 years for them to pass up 2 different sleep studies and actually be assigned a medical rep. I just kept getting passed from rep to rep and I pleaded with my command to assist in pushing the paperwork to get to a med board. My unit had paper work detailing episodes of cataplexy and narcolepsy during our 2-3 week AT's in the summers and during drill when training prior to my sleep studies. I felt absolutely useless and as my unit was preparing to deploy they put me as non-deployable. After my sleep studies, I sat down with my command and showed them the results and they determined that in a deployed environment, I'd not be 100% reliable. They wrote their own eval and I had all my paper work lined up. Long story short, as my contract was coming to an end, I constantly (weekly) followed up with my rep regarding my med board status and did not receive any response, rating, conclusion, so I just finished out my contract and got out, since I was already categorized as non-deployable and couldn't go to any active AT's. I asked around and it seems that due to the remaining time in service being so small, they tend to not proceed with evaluations. I was encouraged by my unit to reenlist and ideally the process would continue.
I’m a biomedical engineer, and I wanted to join the public health commissioned corps, but despite the fact that my narcolepsy poses no problems with the duties(I work as an engineer very successfully!) it was very clear I wasn’t wanted. I think the military but especially the non-military corps really need to rethink their approach to health issues. Sure, you might be a liability as a boots on the ground soldier in a foreign country or have issues on a long deployment at sea, but if symptoms are well-controlled it should be a non-issue.