There is hope for veterans! SSDI approved.

I suffer from pretty severe Meniere's disease, near-daily attacks for the last few years. The VA rated me at 30% for Meniere's in August '25 after a Higher Level Review, but then increased me to 100% P&T (plus SMC-S/housebound status) after another claim last December, which involved two more exams, audiology and vestibular.

I'd been fully out of work since Jan '25 due to the disease, so before the VA increase I filed for SSDI in November '25 with nothing more than my private ENT records (diagnosis and treatment/visits dating back to 2019 through 2024) but once the VA 100% letter arrived, I uploaded that to the SSA just after Christmas.

In mid-January of this year, Florida DDS contacted me for a long interview, let me know my VA status flagged me as priority processing, and the rep suggested I fax him my recent VA exam documentation and anything else that the VA had to grant me the 100%

Faxed that to him on February 9th (FOIA process to get the exam docs from the VA took time) and confirmed he received it. No CE was scheduled.

On February 24th the SSA portal indicated that I'd been selected for a Federal Quality Review. That made me a bit nervous, but...

This morning (at 6:50 AM EST), got an email from the SSA, and the portal indicated "We have made a decision to approve your application on February 26, 2026."

Now it's just a matter of them doing the calculations on EOD, actual monthly amount, etc, but it's a huge weight off my shoulders, and now I know that the light at the end of the tunnel isn't a train, it's the sun.

Oh, should note that I'm 61, I'm sure that played a large part in the approval.