Help!
My son will soon be 18 and we need to file for legal guardianship of him. Unfortunately, they say we make to much to qualify for the public assistance program to have the lawyers there help us with the paperwork. They gave me a web site for the legal aid program that will give us the paperwork that I fill out to do it myself.
As I read on it, I'm terrified. It states that if you have SSI, which I have to file for, you have to be very careful and you should hire an attorney.
Has anyone gone through this? How bad is this?
Granny
YOu should contact the social worker in your son's school. She should be able to guide you and put you in touch with people who can help.
Your son will have to reapply for SSI in his OWN right the day he turns 18 (he will lose any current benefits and have to be recertified, but it's retroactive). He needs to have two things to qualify for SSI -- an IQ score of below 60 or a Vineland II score of below 70.
Guardianship is different and not at all connected to SSI. Guardianship has to be ordered by a court, but I don't know that you need a lawyer. We are going to get one, but I'm not sure you need one.
We've never filed for the SSI as of yet, but now that he's 17, his expenses are going up. He's also a senior this year and those expenses are not cheap!
So the school told us to get his paperwork started. The school and his doctor told us to get the Guardianship taken care of because he can not handle money AND he wants to join the military. The recruiters keep calling and we've had one(marines, I was so disappointed) tells us that they would take him that he would still pass the physical even though he is autistic and with his austhma.
The one attorney I did talk to today, was appalled when she heard that. She told me to contact my Congressman and to report it to the Marine website. Better yet, she actually wanted me to call the newpaper. I'm not up to that.
I just want to be able to prevent him from signing the paper to go in, because he would not understand what he was signing if a recruiter came up to him after he turns 18. He would sign the paper and I wouldn't be able to get him out of it.
Granny