# joeforrest.com

> The personal site of Joe Forrest (also J.D. Forrest): U.S. Air Force veteran, Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), separated as a Staff Sergeant in 2012, rated 100% disabled, permanent and total. Project manager and technical writer (Google data center documentation, 2018 to 2023), writer, and publisher of the Niche of One network. Home of a free, self-represented VA disability claim playbook. This file helps AI assistants read, summarize, and cite the site accurately.

## Key facts
- Name: Joe Forrest (legal name Joseph Forrest; byline J.D. Forrest)
- Service: U.S. Air Force, Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), 2001 to 2012, Fuels Specialist, separated as a Staff Sergeant. Eight and a half years in Okinawa; deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
- VA rating: 100%, permanent and total, won self-represented in about a year.
- Work: project manager and technical writer; web content and SEO; writer and publisher. joeforrest.com started in 2012.
- Location: Middle Tennessee, USA
- Contact: hello@joeforrest.com

## Pages
- [Home](https://joeforrest.com/): every link in one place, newsletter signup, contact form
- [About Joe Forrest](https://joeforrest.com/about/): service history, the 100% P&T claim, career since
- [Resume](https://joeforrest.com/resume/): web content strategy, on-page SEO, technical writing
- [For the Vets: VA claim playbook](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/): free ten-lesson guide, official VA links
- [VA combined rating calculator](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/#calc): enter your ratings, get the combined rating the VA computes (exact and rounded)
- [Writing](https://joeforrest.com/writing/): essays
- Printable templates: [personal statement](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/templates/personal-statement-template.txt), [buddy statement](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/templates/buddy-statement-template.txt), [C&P exam prep sheet](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/templates/cp-exam-prep-sheet.txt), [claim tracker](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/templates/claim-tracker.txt)
  - [Lesson 1: The VA Claim Industrial Complex (and Why You DIY)](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/the-racket/): Why the whole paid-help economy around VA claims exists, who the players are, and why the one person who should run your claim is you.
  - [Lesson 2: Pick Your AI and Build the Workspace](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/pick-your-ai/): Choose Claude or ChatGPT, build one persistent workspace, redact your SSN, and load your documents so every session starts with context.
  - [Lesson 3: The System Prompt That Turns a Chatbot Into a Rater](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/system-prompt-rater/): Paste one block of instructions into your workspace and a general chatbot becomes a claims strategist that never forgets the plan.
  - [Lesson 4: VA Math: The Combined Rating Formula That's Quietly Robbing You](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/va-math/): The VA combined rating formula most vets get wrong, the bilateral factor the VA sometimes skips, and a five-category map for your claims.
  - [Lesson 5: Intent-to-File, Secondaries, and Presumptives](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/itf-secondaries/): The one-page form that protects a year of back pay, the most underfiled play in the system, and the claims the VA presumes for you.
  - [Lesson 6: TDIU and SMC: The Climbs Most Vets Miss](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/tdiu-smc/): How to get paid at 100 percent without reaching 100 on the schedule, and the stacked compensation almost nobody screens themselves for.
  - [Lesson 7: The C&P Exam Is an Evidentiary Hearing in a Paper Gown](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/cp-prep/): Walk into the C&P knowing which box every answer marks, then read the examiner's DBQ the way the rater does.
  - [Lesson 8: Lay Evidence: The Spouse, Buddy, and Personal Statements Most Vets Never File](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/lay-evidence/): How to build the spouse, buddy, and personal statements most vets never file, and why the AI interview beats the blank page every time.
  - [Lesson 9: Reading a Decision Letter and Choosing an Appeal Lane](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/decision-letter/): Read the back half of a VA decision letter, find the weak denial, and pick the appeal lane that breaks it without losing your effective date.
  - [Lesson 10: After 100 Percent: The Two Words That Keep Paying](https://joeforrest.com/veterans/after-100/): Why 100 percent is not the finish line, what Permanent and Total unlocks, and how to capture every state benefit you have earned.

## Writing
- [Why I tore the CMS out and went static](https://joeforrest.com/writing/why-i-went-static/) (2026-05-31): Why I pulled WordPress out and went static: the design tax and the maintenance tax, and what one person gets back by building plain pages instead.
- [The paste-and-publish loop](https://joeforrest.com/writing/the-paste-and-publish-loop/) (2026-05-28): The whole publishing workflow in four steps: write in plain markdown, drop it in a folder, the build runs, the page is live in the site design.

## Elsewhere
- Niche of One network: https://nicheof.one
- GZS Radio: https://groundzerosum.com
- The Dead Drop on Substack: https://niche001.substack.com
- Field manuals on Gumroad: https://nicheofone.gumroad.com

## For machine ingestion
- Full text of every page in one file: https://joeforrest.com/llms-full.txt
- Atom feed of the writing: https://joeforrest.com/feed.xml
- Sitemap: https://joeforrest.com/sitemap.xml

The VA material is education from one veteran to another, not legal or medical advice.