Notes from the Private Investigator Who Followed Me

He was supposed to be proving I wasn't disabled. All he proved was that disabled people can also smile.

I own a wrinkled, water-splashed packet of documents that I’m not supposed to have. The documents were passed on to me by someone who received them from the insurance company that was then providing me money when I was too disabled to work; they were kind enough to provide me with this packet of documents. I want to burn them, but the evidence feels too crucial to destroy.

In the image above, you can see some horribly grainy photographs of myself. I imagine that they must have been taken with a long telephoto lens. The entire time that the private investigator was following me, I did not know that I was being followed.

A little-known (or at least, I believe it’s little-known) fact about private investigators is that they are not so much like the heroes of mystery novels. They usually aren’t solving crimes that the cops can’t manage or even searching out if someone is conducting an extramarital love affair. Most of the time, they’re hired by insurance companies like the one that I dealt with for at least two years, who are trying to prove that their claimants are not disabled.

I share the substance of this packet with you because I find it hilarious and horrifying that the insurance company decided I was no longer too disabled to keep paying as a result of this private investigator’s work. I want you to know the kinds of things that are considered evidence of a woman such as myself, who says that she is very sick but is, in fact, lying.