Most special education lawyers are well versed in SSI and can help. Your consultation may be free but their advise will not be. The good newas is you can use the SSI monies for the lawyer.

This is why I recommend to anyone considering SSI to have a lawyer when they apply. A lawyer knows all the ridiculous rules and can back you up in cases like this and go to bat for you and tell you exactly what to do. I know my turn is coming. One day they will ask me to tell them exactly where the money we have received has gone and I will have to break it down for them each month since we started it. If the numbers don't pan out according to their little rules they will demand the entire amount be paid in full and drop us. Then, because we don't have the money to repay the amount perhaps they will drop it because we can't pay it back. WOW - unbelievable. I know my day is coming and it's going to be painful to sit down and break it down. I know we've spent all the money on our one son but it gets really complicated. I mean, for goodness sakes, 1/7 the portion of the toiletries, 1/7 of the utilities, mortgage, etc..... bills for the car, 1/7 of that plumbing bill....absolutely absurd. It's not worth it without an SSI lawyer but an SSI lawyer only works with people based on getting a huge portion of the back payments from when you first apply. I don't know how that is legal because you're not supposed to spend the money on a lawyer - but I suppose if you do - the lawyer protects you and their income. It's a sick and twisted process that in the end benefits lawyers and puts the poor under immense pain and pressure because without a lawyer - you'd better be blasted careful about how you work the numbers out to show how every cent was spent on that child's needs. You know it works out but you spend alot less than 1/7 of your total income on the rest of the family obviously! Only a lawyer can straighten this out but they won't talk to you - legal aid in your area won't help with issues like this and SSI lawyers want nothing to do with broke people, they have to have a huge percentage of those back payments!!

I have been to a seminar in my area that was about transitioning to age of majority/SSI and the rules and how to follow them. I left feeling overwhelmed. I learned that paying for an hour meeting with the lawyers now would save me a lot of headaches/money later.

the lawyers giving the seminar said that it can vary depending where you live(community) and who the case worker assigned to your case is on how the rules may be applied.

So when you are using SSI - foodstamps gives you $100/less per month so you should be able to count $100 per month for that child for food. Again, you must have a lawyer to make sure you submit the information following the rules and do that correctly. You know the #s work out but you have to be a lawyer and an accountant to show everything the way they need to see it.