SSA tip of the day.drugs and alcohol

0:03 Good day everyone. This is Attorney Anthony Reeves and I am here to give you your Social Security tip of the day. Today's tip of a day is to be open and honest about your experiences using drugs or alcohol. Now, I know this is gonna sound really kind of crazy, but I want you to follow people. When I break this down, under the Social Security Regulation, there will be called a materiality standard as it relates to drugs or alcohol.

0:28 In other words, what they want to know is if you're cleaning, you're not drinking alcohol, or if you're not using drugs, would you still be found disabled. A lot of times what people do is they want to underrepresent the extent of their past drug use or past alcohol use. Don't do that. It is a lot better for your credibility if you just come clean.

0:50 So please don't play the word smithing game. If somebody asks you are you still using drugs or are you still using alcohol? And think, okay, using means using every day, So I'm going to interpret that to me. Do I do it like that? And say no? And then all of a sudden, when you go to your medical records, they find in your records that you've pop positive for drugs, or that you came in and spelling like alcohol. Be upfront and honest. I know sometimes people say, well, there's no guarantee it may help kill my case, or there's no record indicating that I've been using drugs or a call, so I'm cool there.

1:22 Don't play that dangerous game because in the end it can bite you in the backside. Trust me, and I tell you that in the long run, it's in your best interest to be as open and honest as possible. If you know that you used or you relapsed a couple of days ago, or you drink alcohol once or twice a week, be candidate because remember, and we've talked about this before, the more credible you are, the stronger and the greater possibility probability that you can possibly demonstrate that you're disabled. But if the judgement fills right out the gate that you're not being truthful and honest with him or her, you may find yourself in the downhill slide from that point on. Keep in mind, drugs and alcohol do have an impact on

2:00 your social security case, but you can control how much of an impact it is. And a couple of things that you also need to be aware of if you abstain from alcohol and drugs. I know you don't want to hear it. But the longer that you abstain and the longer you meaning the longer you stop using drugs alcohol, the stronger you can demonstrate that it doesn't have an impact on your case if you're still having problems. Here's what I mean.

2:24 Sometimes people want to rush and say, well, I'll stop drinking drugs alcohol, let's hurt and get my case to the hearing. Well. Unfortunately, if you've only stopped, like a couple of days ago, from drinking out drug, drinking alcohol or using drugs on a regular basis, the court is trying to look at the longest period of sobriety to see how you were doing during that time. Trust when I tell you that the longer period that you have, you have a more clear cut, definitive period of time to show the court of how you were still in bad shape during that time period.

2:53 So just keep those things in the bacuum of mind. If you want to know any more additional tips, you can check me out about blog at least you'll beat dot Anthony Reeves dot com, or just simply hit me up at www dot reeves firm dot com have a wonderful day.