If you're over 50 and applying for Social Security disability, I have some special advice about one piece of SSA paperwork: the Adult Function Report. The SSA sends it to just about every claimant, and it asks you to describe how you get through a normal day. Most of the questions on that form matter. But one of them, question 20A, my favorite question on the whole form, matters more than people realize, and not for the reason you'd probably guess.

One of the main hurdles you have to clear when you're 50 or older is showing that you can't go back to your past work. Here's the pattern I see over and over: it is often very easy to eliminate your past work for mental health reasons, and very hard to eliminate it for physical reasons, even when a physical condition is the whole reason you're applying in the first place. That's what makes question 20A so important.

The question gives you a list of about nineteen abilities and asks you to check every one that your illnesses, injuries, or conditions affect. A lot of them are physical, lifting, squatting, and so on. Those matter, but they aren't the ones I'm talking about here. The boxes I care about are:

If you have any problem at all in any of these areas, you need to check those boxes.

I don't mean memory as in whether you can remember basic things like people's birthdays. I mean any deficit, including trouble with memory or focus that comes from the side effects of your medications. If you're dealing with anxiety or depression, even the slightest symptom counts. These things have a big effect downstream in your case, and they're often what decides whether your past work gets eliminated.

Say your case ends up in front of a judge, and the thing standing between you and benefits is whether your past work can be eliminated. If those boxes weren't checked on your Adult Function Report, it gets really hard for your lawyer to stand up and say, "Your honor, I know my client didn't say they had any problems with memory, completing tasks, or concentration when they first applied, but now that they've had a chance to talk with me and prepare for the hearing, they do actually have deficits in those areas." That's a tough argument to make after the fact.

Of course, all of this needs to be supported in your medical file. If you're experiencing anxiety or depression because you've lost your physical ability to function and your ability to work, and most people in that situation are, you can go get treatment for it, and that treatment backs up what you put on the form. Even mild limitations in these areas can be what makes or breaks a case when you're over 50 and trying to eliminate past work.

We always want to give the SSA honest answers. If there is truly no problem at all in an area, don't check it. But do some soul searching. Think very hard and carefully about whether you're having any deficits in memory, concentration, completing tasks, understanding, following instructions, or getting along with others. Because checking those boxes wins a lot of disability cases.

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