Ask HN: I'm disabled and out of money. Now what?

Hacker News new | past | comments | to ask | show | jobs | submit connection Ask HN: I'm disabled and out of money. Now what? 280 points by thrwtllwy 3 hours ago | hide | past | favorite | 180 comments TL; DR: I'm a successful founder, but now I'm disabled, I can't keep a job. I'm about to default on my car. I am (unsurprisingly) depressed. I need help but I don't know where to go.

I spent the 2010s as a founder. My business was funded by YC and several others. We've had moderate success, but haven't seen a significant release. After my startup failed, I started consulting to pay the bills.

In 2018, I started having chronic pain issues and gradually became less and less capable at work. Consultation gigs let me go because I couldn't keep up. The last time I worked was over a year ago, and I finally exhausted my savings in early June 2022.

I'm living as cheaply as possible at this point. I live with my family and only pay for the bare necessities. This works out to between $1,200 and $1,500 per month.

I'm in the US and have an application for SSDI, but from what I've heard it's very difficult to get benefits, especially if you have an invisible condition like chronic pain. It is likely that my application will initially be denied and I will have to focus on an appeal. It could take a year or more of fights to get approved.

I sell some of my old stuff on eBay, but it's exhausting and frustrating given my limitations. It is not sustainable.

I have a car payment due soon and I'm already one overdue.

Worst of all is that my life is pretty dull at this point. I'm obviously depressed. I see a therapist and a psychiatrist but basically the source of my depression is the state of my life. I have nothing to look forward to. I can't even afford to throw a few bucks on side projects so at least I have something to do with my time... I mostly watch TV, play video games and lurk on the internet . It's absolutely mind-boggling.

I think, in the right environment, I could finish a weekly workload of a little less than half time and slowly relearn how to work again even with my limitations, but no one wants to hire a handicapped person middle-aged person for a part-time job. Also, all of my experience is in startups and that makes me less acceptable to larger companies, but larger companies have more options for accommodating people with disabilities.

I don't know what to do. Has anyone from the HN community been here?

EDIT: A few people have asked me what I'd like to do if I had to work again. The answer is I don't know!

Before I started having problems, I was a backend-focused web developer, but I'm kind of burnt out these days.

I've always wanted to get into the embedded, but I don't know if I can do a lateral move like this in my current state.

Whatever I do, it has to be with someone who gives me the space to try, fail and try again. It really is ...