One Year Later

A year ago on this day I'd begin my journey as a disability claims adjudicator & I'll say it has been an interesting roller coaster ride with many ups & downs as well as twists & turns.

I remember I spend much of October 2005 writing about this possible "governemnt job", but I wasn't really sure what it was I was gettng myself into. I even refered to the job with the wrong Acronyn. I thought I was applying/interviewing for a job at DORS (Department of Rehabilitation Services) LOL. Although my job has in association with DORS, I'd later find out that I'm really working for the SSA (Social Security Administration) as part of their DDS (Disability Determination Services)department. I'd also learn that the job is a major change from what I was use to. Instead of working hands on with disabled people, I'd be confined to a cubicle processing disability cases.

At first I found the job very confusing & for a good couple months I was struggling with my caseload. I even came to a point where I was about to throw in the towel & just quit, but with the encouragement of some of my coworkers & just my stubborness of not wanting to give up, I gave the job another chance. I'm not sure what happened, but all of a sudden the job started to make sense and evereything seemed to click. Around March of this year I started to get the hang of my job & my cases started to move. By June of this year I started to receive compliments from my supervisors & the medical staff. Not too long ago I got the following e-mail from one of our psych staff:

"Jqhn, thanks for the great PRTF on Ms. Thomas; ss# ***-**-****. You created a concise, great PRTF. Those PRTF's like yours makes our jobs so much quicker!
Thanks again, for all your hard work.
Dr. W"

Also, in the past 2 months I have been able to decrease my pending from 120 plus cases to a current caseload of only 88 cases. In addition to that, the week of October 30th I cleared a record number of 21 cases & was awarded the “star producer title” from my current supervisor. Today I had a review with my supervisor & she had nothing but good things to say about me & my work ethic. It was just a good feeling to hear such praise. Also, it doesn't hurt to hear that I'll be receiving a nice pay increase as well : )

All in all, it's amazing how in a year's time I can go from working a job in which I had no idea what I'm getting into, being totally clueless, & having such rough time to the point in which I wanted to quit to doing an outstanding job & being one of the star producers at my job. It definitely has been an interesting ride so far.