Monday, May 25, 2009

Provincial Government agencies all work together?

In 1999 was when I suffered my last work related injury ( which reoccurred for the forth time), I was forced into fighting for my claim with the Alberta Workers Compensation Board as my Doctor said enough is enough, to many times I had re-injured my lower back and hips, with over a year off each time; and each time to be cut off by WCB for what ever reason they came up with. This last time was a fight that took almost two years of paper and WCB personal shuffle, living those months I will never forget. First my employer Tracer Canada Inc, which is a company out of the U.S; who's representative had stopped my doctor in the hallway leading up to the examination room I was in. My employer's representative (safety officer) requested to the doctor NOT to list this as a lost time injury, regardless of what had happened; my doctor REFUSED. I then returned to the job site with more medical appointments for chiropractor,physiotherapy and my doctor for the next week. My employer then set me on light duty at work, mainly paper work of schedules and material confirmations. The safety officer for the company informed me that he would be taking me to my appointments so the company would know first hand what is happening with my injury,but when it was time for appointments I was informed I had to find my own transportation to the appointment; without my own vehicle as I car pooled to work, I was forced to walk/ hitch hike 5 miles to town then across town to the doctors office; while re-injuring myself along the way. That had happened 3 separate times and my employer making comments of "Alberta WCB's treatment of the injured worker was to lenient, this would never happen in the states; time to get the WCB laws changed so the workers can't be faking it". My last appointment with the doctor after he received the reports from the chiropractor and physiotherapist stated I could no-longer return to my trade as an electrician, so into WCB's hands I went.After two and a half months of WCB's physical rehabilitation, their answer to everything whether you are physically capable or not, which I wasn't. Due to the pain and immobility they inflicted upon me by their routine of therapy,which after three weeks,I had re-structured myself in order to decrease the pain and increase my mobility to enable myself to be there each day so I wasn't penalized or cut off benefits. It had come to the point of a supervisor making a comment to the therapist "why do we pay you when the claimant sets their own program, which in turn caused me more pain an immobility again to the point of not being able to lift myself out of bed or even to sit and get back up again without a type of mechanical assistance; it was then I was cut off and forced to fight in appeals. During my fight in the Appeals process the department of Child Services came into the picture, they had heard I did not have an income, the children were going without food and that I was abusing the children due to the stress of fighting the WCB. They then decided to monitor our household 24/7 claiming it would only be a few days, it turned out to be 54 days of constant watching, my wife and I were forced to sleep with our bedroom door open as we found a listening device beside it. My WCB files had been gone through as was all the information I had been gathering to enable me to proceed with my appeal, which some of that was copied down into our "baby sitters" daily statements.On the 54th day Social Services took our children into their custody due to my second oldest getting two swats on the butt for putting two rather large holes in the new drywall that had been completed a month before, of which the child had been warned that would happen if there was to be any more holes in the wall, which is why it was redone in the first place. Two years of fighting the department of Social Services, only to find out in the court room that they too practice file manipulation as does the WCB, those two swats on the butt with the flat of my hand were written down as multiple excessive punches upon the child's body. What all this had done to our family was devastating enough, but to have to live in a community that heard what the Social Workers claimed made living there very hard, threats continually, literally having to physically defend myself from others that didn't know me or my wife and friends going to odds with each other over this whole mess. As I was attempting to start my own business and everything else going, on we decided to move to the country so I would could show my determination towards and have less overhead for my business; which I was penalized by WCB for not getting their permission to move to that location ; but if I moved to the city they would have paid for my movers and covered first months rent(according to Rob VanDoesburg clam's manager, who was no-longer my claims manager after I moved)

In the mean time I had won my appeal from the WCB, even with the mis-information from my employer and WCB as I was able to show on file that they had conspired together on manipulation of information in order to have my claim denied and another year and a half later we won our court case against the Department of Social Services; although we now had four very messed up children, so messed up that one child had to be put on medications for behavioral problems (not our choice)that were created from being shifted from foster home to foster home.I found that WCB and Social Services both use improper medical and psychological tactics, even in using the worst professionals that are out there, re-writing information, contradicting themselves and posing a holier then thou attitude, all this just to show that worker or claims manger was always right and everyone else is wrong, to the point of withholding information from the professionals that were hired by my wife and I to assist us in correcting what ever wrongs we may have done; which we found out later in court we had not committed any wrong's.
But again WCB and Social Services have teamed up together, it seems that when they want you and your family to live in poverty they will go to any lengths to keep it that way, as I am once again facing charges from trying to keep my family fed, if I didn't then I would be on charges again for not feeding my family

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