Exper. securing SSI w/o profess. help?

[Guest guest]

Dear Fellow Parents,

   Our 21-year-old daughter has significant physical & cognitive disabilities as

a result of prematurity.  Our daughter is now at a place emotionally where she

can acknowledge her disabilities enough for us to pursue social security for

her. (We are not her guardians, though per her doc & us parents, guardianship

would be appropriate.)  I'll briefly describe our daughter's make-up below. 

What I'd like to know is if anyone with a similar child has succeeded in

securing social security for the child without paying a professional to handle

the effort nor going crazy in the process. 

   Daughter, as I'll call her, had severe strokes as an extremely premature

baby.  Her left hemiplegic cerebral palsy and other disabilities are from the

strokes.  She can walk with a limp; her left hand is useful only for stabilizing

in conjunction with the right hand (no fine motor abilities in L hand.)  She has

a mild hearing loss and a dragged retina, which results in monocular vision. 

She's on med. to prevent seizures.  She pulls out her eyebrows

(trichotillomania.)  She has a significant social skills deficit.

   Daughter just had a 3-year re-eval done through her transition program.  Here

are some of the results:

-Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (4th ed.)

   Verbal comprehension 95 (37th percentile)

   Working memory 83 (13th percentile)

   Perceptual reasoning 63 (1%ile)

   Processing speed 79 (8 %ile)

        No full-scale IQ was given due to the wide disparity between verbal &

non-verbal areas.

     To put the above in plain language, Daughter is at the low end of normal in

verbal abilities and has serious non-verbal learning disabilities.

-Social-emotional-behavioral functioning

   The Behavior Assess. System for Children, 2nd ed (BASC-2) showed scores

indicating " at risk " to " clinically significant " in anxiety, depression, and

somatization.  Those scores are validated by the way our daughter has been in

day-to-day life.  Daughter takes RX medication for anxiety, depression, seizure

disorder, and ADD.

-Executive functioning

   The Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF) showed

significant executive function deficits in behavioral regulation, metacognition,

and the Global Executive Composite summary score.  In plain language, our

daughter has trouble with managing emotions, controlling behavior when she has

intense feelings, initiating, working memory, planning/organizing,

self-monitoring, flexing according to the demands of a situation, and

problem-solving.  She spent 12 days in a psych unit 18 months ago due to

emotional & executive function problems.  She's been to therapy for the last

6-1/2 years.

   In addition, Daughter has been unable to perform at an employable level in 4+

vocational experiences that her transition program has arranged & coached her

in.

   Where the rubber meets the road at home, Daughter needs prompting and

on-going coaching to get things accomplished and manage her

activities/responsibilities.  It has been an ongoing drain on me.

    Daughter has taken a few classes at the local community college, getting a D

in pre-college math the first time, a Bor C the 2nd time, a B in art (teacher

gave a much higher grade than rubrics would have warranted), B in pre-college

writing, dropped the next pre-college writing class rather than fail, and a B or

C in basic computing.

   All the above said, do any of you have any thoughts for us re: whether to

attempt on our own to secure social security for Daughter?    Callmemom