Veterans Support Group
This community is dedicated to all veterans of armed forces, and the health and life challenges they face. A veteran often refers to retired armed services personnel, one one who has served in the armed forces and has an honorable discharge. Join many others in sharing your experiences to find support.
i'm trying to make a decision on whether or not to hire a lawyer for my VA claim. i put a claim in for FMS in 06. the VA has denied my claim that it's service connected TWICE! i am appealing again of course. the American Legion has been my rep for over 2 years. he is working really hard on my case. anyway i was referred to a lawyer by some one and left a msg for her to call me. so she called me and told me that she takes on cases but for 20% of the back pay when case is won. that's a lot of money!
now on another issue.... the military originally medically retired me from active duty, so i was receiving retired pay and had a blue retiree ID. now this is totally separate from the VA, this is DOD. well the department of the Navy handles med boards in the Marine Corps, right? so the dep of the NAvy is the one that sent me the letter that was cutting me off retiree pay almost a year ago. they stopped my retiree pay and took my ID almost 1 year ago saying that my back injury was no longer effecting my life. which is a bunch of BS cuz i'm on SSDI now so i can't work.
anyway, getting to the point of the question for you... i spoke to the lawyer about all this and she wants to represent me for BOTH cases and not half or just one case for the 20% of my back pay. but when talking to her it seemed that she wasn't at all familiar with the med board system and how medically retired works for the MILITARY (not the VA). she does VA claims all the time but it seems she doesn't know anything about appealing to the military, but she wants to take both cases. so i am a bit shaky about whether or not i should hire her. i need everyone's opinions on this matter. i wanna hear your thoughts. should i hire her or not?
now on another issue.... the military originally medically retired me from active duty, so i was receiving retired pay and had a blue retiree ID. now this is totally separate from the VA, this is DOD. well the department of the Navy handles med boards in the Marine Corps, right? so the dep of the NAvy is the one that sent me the letter that was cutting me off retiree pay almost a year ago. they stopped my retiree pay and took my ID almost 1 year ago saying that my back injury was no longer effecting my life. which is a bunch of BS cuz i'm on SSDI now so i can't work.
anyway, getting to the point of the question for you... i spoke to the lawyer about all this and she wants to represent me for BOTH cases and not half or just one case for the 20% of my back pay. but when talking to her it seemed that she wasn't at all familiar with the med board system and how medically retired works for the MILITARY (not the VA). she does VA claims all the time but it seems she doesn't know anything about appealing to the military, but she wants to take both cases. so i am a bit shaky about whether or not i should hire her. i need everyone's opinions on this matter. i wanna hear your thoughts. should i hire her or not?
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My 6mo twin DD's are EBF and just started rice cereal on the first. Everything has been going fine except this morning one of them had a diaper rash (lots of redness around her anus). I read this as one of the signs of an allergy. BUT I did just buy a different brand diaper yesterday (which they have used randomly before w/no issues). Do you think its the cereal or the diaper? Im ready to start...
I just won my appeal with the VA. When I spoke to the American Legion rep assigned to my case, she was pushing again for 100% disability.
In my opinion, rather than need a lawyer for VA disability, you need to continue appealing, continue building a medical record, and wait. But that is only my opinion.
As for issue #2,.. I cannot comment.