We Play Trains, Mum Goes To Work, Boo Hoo!

Anyone who got a letter this morning for the generous increases in child benefit will no doubt have had this leaflet fall out with the picture of children playing which is titled " We Play Trains, Mum Goes To Work, Whoo Whoo!".

Is this the part of the labours plan to get Mothers to abandon their children with childcare, start going to college to make preparations to go back to work, or if you are lucky enough to find a job, then to come back exhausted and then start looking after the children.

Labour should recognise that bringing up a child is more than a full-time job in itself. A child needs to bond with its parents. I feel strongly about this.

A child when it is growing up needs its parents rather than being dumped at child care to be looked after by an barely qualified childcare assistant. I could not imagine my Wife taking our 2 year old son and taking him to childcare, you would have to literally peel him off her leg.

I feel because of Labours plans to get as many people into work as possible there is going to be a whole new generation of latch-key kids. I often wonder why do people have children then dump them at childcare and go back to work after three months?. I often think that the child is going to spend more time with the childcare assistant that it is with its own Mother

I have seen when I have been up to the school to collect my Daughter the children who finish school then go straight to the Before & Afterschool club to wait for a parent/relative to pick them up at 5-6 pm. The whole process starts again in the morning all in the process of going to work to earn enough money to pay for the childcare and have enough to live on.

When my Brother & I got home from school, my Dad was usually at work, my Mother was there or you could usually find her round the corner talking to one of the pensioners who lived in the block of houses next door. The point I am making is that I never had to go to any after school club [they had not even been thought of in the seventies] and wait for my parents to pick me up at 6pm. The only time I got picked up after school was either after playing football or for 1 after school detention.

Its the same old thing I said about before with the incapacity benefit, why does everything revolve round having to go to work?. People should be able to make there own choices, what happens if you want to be a homemaker?.

On the Incapacity benefit front I have not been looking what's going on with IB of late, cancelled all the google alerts as I have only going to drive myself la-la or into an early grave worrying about it. There's virtually no point looking for a job in a recession, not that there would be many jobs to suit me anyway or that can pay enough, no point going to any of the pathways to work people as I have said before because they are only in it to make a profit unless I can be convinced otherwise.

I have decided in the meantime to wait for the next brown envelope from hell and not worry until it actually comes. Thinking back to when I went to the psychiatrist when they said that there is no point worrying about things that you can not change, well I am taking that view at the moment.

I will try to enjoy Christmas and be positive for next year

have a fantastic one and a fantastic new year folks

brainblogger

Employment & Support Allowance

So Employment & Support Allowance is here to stay to replace Incapacity Benefit. Having got through an IB50 allegedly I will not be checked again until 2013. That means nothing to me. It could be tomorrow as far as I am concerned.

Whatever happens there is nothing I can do to stop being swept up into it. well what do I do now? Do I sit and do nothing and wait for it to happen?. People say to me that I shouldn't worry myself about it and just wait till it happens. I am sorry to disappoint you folks but I am worrying about it now.

The DWP virtually say in there explanation of ESA that as long as you can breath you are fit for some type of work. I have already read a lot about the ESA and there are many things written in to it to make your illnesses or disabilities not be as severe as they are for you the actual sufferer.

To me the ESA is nothing more than glorified jobseekers allowance.

So that leaves few choices: work or suffer on the pittance the government think you need to live on while not forgetting to go to your work-focused interviews or you will get sanctioned.

If you want to try and find a job [not that you haven't already been trying] don't forgot there's a recession looming on so there aren't that many jobs about really as everyone seems to think there are. You will have to compete with the people who have just lost there jobs and the employers who don't employ disabled people which I have said about in a previous post.

ESA is just a trap so the government can save money to pay for bailing out banks, wars and making the rich even richer. The sick and the disabled and the unemployed are just treated as some sort of under-class.

I don't believe all this garbage the DWP are coming out with how going to work will help your self-esteem and make you feel better. Robert wrote in my last post about him only being offered jobs at Asda handing out baskets. Sorry but handing out baskets at probably the minimum wage would not do Robert's or anyone's self esteem any good however wonderful it may be made up to sound.

The ESA has also been designed so people will worry and end up on the pathways to work so they can also make a profit out of your misery.

I also hold responsible the Jobcentre for failing in all there promises they made to me of helping me get back to work.

How the DEA raved on about how how wonderful it would be to go to rehab in Birmingham for eight months and how they would help me get a job. I went to Birmingham virtually every day for eight months and all they did was get me a voluntary work placement and effectively dumped me there. After all that they closed my case. Where is all the support? I am no nearer to a job as I was then.

I am nearly 40 years old, had a life threatening brain injury and I have got to start at the bottom again. ain't it about time somebody gave me a break for a change. It isn't all my fault I am in this situation. I can not be held responsible for everything that has happened.

The people who I trusted to help me get back into work have failed me and all they have done is make a profit out of me.

Politicians

Having recovered from the brown envelope from hell and the next door neighbour trying to run me over I thought its about time I did something on my blog.

The DWP letter said I will not be assessed for another 5 years [allegedly] I am still afraid. I worry about what going to happen next. I just try to go from one day to the other and see what happens next.

Just lately I have been doing quite a bit of writing. I am helping a lecturer in social work at a university who contacted me, all voluntary of course. I have been writing about my experience of having a brain injury, the correct description is actually I have very severe cranio-cerebral injury with clear evidence of damage to the frontal and temporal regions of my brain.

I am writing what it is like waking up after being in a coma, how I felt and how I feel now, peoples attitudes to a hidden disability like when I go out and about and the "Does he take sugar?" effect when you try to conduct your daily business, you know like how difficult it can be when you try to do something simple like order a couple of meals in a pub, you know when your brain knows what you want to say but you can't get it all out how you want and the person taking the order thinks you are a bit of a simpleton, then there are people tutting behind you because you are a bit slow and then trying to deal with all the multiple noises around as well, it can be very difficult.

Would it have made a difference to my recovery if I could of gone to a rehab centre sooner, rather than have to wait five years, the inadequacies of case management that charge £35-£40 an hour and then later withdraw there support because they are not making a profit from you and how when you went to the appointment they kept looking at the clock to make sure you stayed the full hour, how you can't get to see a social worker face to face now like I used to who helped me, going on schemes setup by the jobcentre that don't help, the brown envelopes from hell, medicals, ideally it is to help the students understand what it is really like for someone being in this position.

I have a date for next year when it is to be presented which at the way things are going it will soon be here. I am looking forward to it but it sounds daunting so I am going to build myself up to it. When I contact the lecturer and show what I have written I keep getting more ideas so I have to write them in. I have also dug up a lot of old paperwork and I keep finding things that I now want to write in as well.

Just lately the government and the opposition are both been ranting on about getting the scroungers, no I mean the disabled/sick people and unemployed back into work, but with the banking crisis and possible recession jobs are scarce let alone jobs for disabled people as well. James Purnell could not have picked a worse time to bring in the ESA. Where are all the jobs for disabled going to come from and who's going to pay for all this support?

They are also going on about giving disabled people all this support, what support?, in my experience so far the support stopped as soon as they got me the voluntary work placement. Where will the support end? Will it end as soon as they have got you into a job and off the ESA? Will they provide support for you once you in your job?.

The conservatives have been going on about including the 3 strikes and you are out for people on IB as well as the unemployed if you refuse a reasonable job offer. I have applied for jobs but I haven't had 3 reasonable job offers yet. Its a miracle even to got a reply to say that you haven't even get an interview. Getting a job offer would be a miracle in itself.

I have read a letter from 1994 from an employment & rehabilitation consultant to my solicitor which said because of the level of my injury I would not have been even considered for sheltered employment [places like Remploy, a Remploy manager has to run his factory at a cost effective basis, therefore when a vacancy does arise the Remploy manager is likely to chose the most profiecent worker and not the slowest] and that there would have been many more suitable candidates. Whether this has changed now I do not know.

It was considered that I had no current earnings prospects and would not be placeable in the open labour market.

Also in the same letter it said relating to the DEA and disability services of the DWP that it was now common practice for the disability services to take no action whilst a person is in continuing receipt of Invalidity Benefit [which is now IB].

If this was happening in 1994 and that I was just considered a lost cause then what if it this applies to all the other people that were on IB then it is no wonder there is 2.6 million people on IB. It seems that what the government and future governments are trying to do now is shut the stable door after the horse has bolted. They are not going to find it so easy as they make out.

When I was talking to the lecturer I said was is it just me but when I see disabled people at work they are doing the things I have mentioned before in my blog like the sweeping litter in shopping centres or push trolleys in DIY store and she agreed with me. It is not just me who thinks that.

People also fail to realise that disabled people actually want to make a future for themselves as well and have prospects and will not just take any job. There are things to consider like having enough money to pay the bills, have enough food to eat. have enough money to survive on from day to day. We are all allowed our own dreams for what sort of future we want and not just do what the ministers think we should do.

The World According to Russell

On my way home from work the other day I was using the zebra crossing near to where I live. One car stopped and the one coming the other way was a distance away to be able to see me and stop. However it just carried on while I was virtually in the middle of the crossing, another step and I would have been another statistic, unfortunately it just happened to be the next door neighbour in there big 4x4. rather incensed by the fact that she had nearly knocked me over I knocked on there front door and I said "did you realise you nearly fucking knocked me over at the crossing" you are supposed to fucking stop at the crossing when someone is walking across" all she said was "I didn't see you ". I can't remember whether she said sorry. If she did I would have been happy enough about that and perhaps she won't do it again the next time.

A little later on her Husband Russell came round to say that I shouldn't go round to there house swearing in the street [despite the fact his wife could have killed me]. What am I supposed to do go round to later for a cup of tea and cucumber sandwiches and say "when you next go over the crossing be careful and just try and make a better job of it next time"

Russell is the kind of guy who is aggressive, paranoid, intimidating and in the past has had heated arguments with his wife which the whole street and beyond can hear and he pushed her out round the lawn and then comes round our house ranting about was it us called the police.

I said to him don't come round here giving me a lecture when you should be more worried about wife's driving. I had every right to be angry. I have already been involved in one road accident and been on a life support machine and left brain damaged and I haven't any more plans to be on a life support machine. he said "I bet you don't know what a lecture is mate?", after I told him I had a brain injury he started talking to me like I was a bit simple. This in turn prompted my Wife to arrive on the scene and she said to him not to talk to me like I'm stupid.

My children were traumatised by the whole thing and hid in there bedroom and later said that they were glad that the nasty man from next door had gone away.

I did phone the police up later about about the near miss at the crossing but they could not do anything as I had not been injured or killed.

So if you drive a car and you go over a crossing while someone is walking across it doesn't matter until you are actually hit. it doesn't make sense that you have to be injured first before anyone can do anything.

I emailed the county council about the crossing and its dangers and they said it is going to be converted into a puffin crossing. Whether that makes it any safer I will have to wait and see

Give it to the Cripple Pt.2

I finally heard from McDonald's about my complaint after my visit a couple of weeks ago. It is just a basic acknowledgement of my email but it doesn't answer my actual complaint. It makes them aware though that people listen to what there staff are saying in front of customers.

Whether anyone actually does anything about the guy who said "give it to the cripple" is a different matter.  This is basically what they said:

Thank you for contacting us about your visit.

As a company we aim to provide 100% customer satisfaction and high standards of quality, service and cleanliness at all times. I regret this has not been your experience on this occasion

Your comments are taken seriously by us and have been passed to the management team.  The details of your complaint will be used as part of their assessment of the restaurant's performance and procedures.  These ongoing reviews help to identify any areas needing improvement within the restaurant.

Get Back to Work, You Sponging Scumbags.

I found this interesting article in the Timesonline about a new TV programme aimed at benefit claimants:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/carol_midgley/article4726714.ece?openComment=true

Brown Envelope from Hell Part 2

First I would like to say thank you to Benefitscroungingscum for plugging my blog. I have not got a thing for Jeremy Kyle but it makes me angry when I hear the media say that allegedly Incapacity benefit recipients are sitting on there backsides watching the 42" plasma tv watching Jeremy Kyle.

I just came up with this taking it easy watching Jeremy Kyle and it seemed to stick. I imagine Bendygirl came up with hers with how people see benefits recipients as scrounging scum or benefit cheats rather than human beings just trying to get on with there lives as best they can.

While on the subject of TVs I was given a TV because someone had just bought a new one and thought I would like there old one which was very kind. If anyone would like to donate a 42" plasma tv that would be nice as well.

If the media actually took the time to see how people on IB get through day to day, week to week, month to month, they might find out what it is like to be on IB.

I had my brown envelope from hell come this morning, after I stopped shaking I read that the DWP have decided that I do not need a medical [that's a relief in itself] and I have enough points and my case will not be reviewed until September 2013. I have been since told that 5 years is the maximum that they can leave before another review. It was also a good indication what was in my brown envelope that there was not a map to go to the medical test centre. I think it is the first time I have not had to go to a medical.

What a nightmare it has all been what I have had to go through in the last few weeks just to prove I have had a brain injury and the symptoms exit and I am not just making it up. Why is it necessary to put IB recipients through all this?. We would all love to go to work but peoples medical conditions can make it difficult. I could sit at home feeling sorry for myself but I don't and I find doing voluntary work is quite therapeutic and I am putting something back into the community.

Having recently seeing how a McDonald's staff member treated there disabled team member I certainly won't be rushing to apply to take meals out to the customer in the blue bay. I never did hear anything about my complaint about my observation.

No doubt though James Purnell and his cronies or whoever in the future will think of new ways to pick on disabled people. They are probably thinking up something new now.

I feel that the my recent experience with the IB50 has not helped my health at all with all the worrying. I have been worrying about stupid things like whether the DWP have been parked outside in the car park where I volunteer checking on me. I imagine it will take a few days to sink in and I will start sleep properly again.

The only thing I am thinking of buying at the moment is the definite remastered edition of Rage In Eden by Ultravox. I loved the album when it came out the first time, it is a very dark album, I still love Billy Currie's swirling synthesizer riffs while he makes love to his keyboards. it still sounds as good as it was then in 1981.

right I am off now to go and sit in front of the 42" inch plasma TV and watch Jeremy. Where's the lottery ticket?

Give It To The Cripple!

When in McDonald's recently I was waiting at the counter when I overhead one of the staff behind the counter asking a young man to take a meal out to a customer to the blue bay in the car park.

This young man said why should I? Give it to the cripple!. [The cripple he was referring to was the disabled lady who I feel sorry for who I said about before in one of my earlier posts]

I scowled at him as I had heard what he said and he knew I had heard exactly what he said as well, he just gave a false laugh and said he was he was only joking. I don't think he was joking somehow. I found this type of comment in the workplace about a co-worker appalling. It reminds me of the bully at school saying you were a spastic because you said something wrong and everyone in the class laughed at you.

I have written to McDonald's as I feel this is unacceptable especially in customer service environment and I am awaiting there reply. I don't know whether anything like this is covered by the Disability Discrimination Act as the lady in question wasn't close by. Would this be covered under the DDA?. I have heard and read about discrimination in the workplace but to see it happening in front of my own eyes is something else.

The Calm Before The Storm

All my creative juices have dried up doing my blog and I have been off the radar since I got the IB50. I have felt drained, stressed out, my confidence has drained out of me and I have been quite short tempered.

It is almost two weeks since I sent the IB50 back and so far I have heard nothing.

I am on brown envelope watch again dreading what comes through the post but so far all I have had is a few bills, the same free papers, leaflets for every different pizza, Chinese, Indian meals and any other crap that comes through my letterbox which I don't mind at the moment.

I imagine the DWP are just checking with my GP just to check that I still have a brain injury even though it is well documented and I did actually go and see the community psychiatric nurse [I think she's called a counsellor now] just recently about my anxiety and starting to feel depressed and that I wasn't making it all up. I could of easily of been on some medication to help but I did not take that option. Medication is an easy option but it doesn't always work.

I am quite anxious to what the outcome of what this review is. I have been thinking about all the possible outcomes. One of the outcomes is having to live off £55 a week on Jobseekers Allowance, signing on and having to go through the appeal process fills me with dread. Having had previous experience of this before so I know what to expect if it happens.

I remember when I used to work full-time in the day time and then work part-time in the evenings and compare it to now, I used to start at work at 8.30 in the morning and come home at 10.30pm in the evening. now I start at 9pm then come home at about 2pm from voluntary work and I feel exhausted, the rest of the afternoon is usually a write off as I try not to go to sleep. I can drink a cup of coffee when I get home and can still be asleep 20 minutes later, coffee, lucozade and red bull and these sort of things makes little or no difference. Nothing has changed in he last 14 years and I go some the same thing virtually every day and its very frustrating. In head injury terms I have reached a plateau and I ain't going to make a over night recovery. I reached this plateau a long time ago.

I have been talking to some people about my situation with the IB50 and the possible outcomes and they can't believe what I have to go through just to prove that I have an acquired disability.

I don't even know how long I am supposed to wait now to find out or do I just wait for another brown envelope or a phone call out of the blue. Perhaps I will get the brown envelope tomorrow on my birthday what a fun day that will be.

I read this blog today and I found it very annoying as it is tarring all incapacity benefit claimants with the same brush and not looking at the actual facts.

http://www.loughboroughecho.net/views-and-blogs/matt-jarram-column/2008/08/21/time-called-on-benefit-claimants-73871-21577374/

I reckon he has been taking lessons from James Purnell. Perhaps he ought to try being me for a couple of years and see how he gets on. I have have better aspirations than working at McDonald's and clearing up other peoples crap. More about them later and one of there employees attitude towards a disabled employee.

I feel there has been some sort of conspiracy where all this type of thing keeps appearing in the media attacking Incapacity Benefit claimants, there was the panaroma episode about benefit claimants, the DWP/Government programme On the Fiddle, every other day there is something in the newspapers about benefit scroungers or fraud cases. then there is things about the new pathways to work or rather pathways to hell. I found this quite shocking: http://a-i-darlo.com/wordpress/?p=55

Why doesn't some someone do something sensible to help rather than claimants be prodded with a cattle prod and the usual threats against claimants. It doesn't exactly motivate me to rush out and try and get a job and it doesn't work.

I would love to have a 42" HD tv and a Nintendo Wii but I have other responsibilities to attend to like where is my next lot of money coming from?.

Waiting In The Condemned Cell

I finally got the IB50 filled in with a lot of help and virtually wrote my life story. It has been sent it back to see the pending result. I imagine I will be getting another brown envelope soon with the map to where the medical examination centre is as if I don't already know. I know what it must feel like waiting in the condemned cell because now it is the time to wait and see what the decision is and if I have a medical to go to next. Why do I have to keep going through this?.

I have been looking at all the notes from when I had to appeal because of some clueless doctors decision with little or no knowledge of head injuries. I hope I haven't to go through that all over again because that's a nightmare in itself.

I feel like I have had every ounce of energy slowly drained out of me not that I had much to start off with and all my enthusiasm drained out of me as well. I felt better when I was in a coma.

I was supposed to be on two weeks off from my voluntary work but it has been a disaster. All I have been doing is going backwards and forwards seeing the lady to help get the IB50 filled in. All the things I had thought I was going to do in the time I had off hasn't happened.

I am supposed to be going back to voluntary work on Monday but where I am going to find the energy and enthusiasm from I do not know. I always feel like I have to go backwards to go forwards all the time. I feel like I have gone back a couple of years to where I was then, to me it feels exactly the same again. I don't know if this happens to other people when the get this damn form but this is what is doing to me.

Stress

I haven't felt like doing any blogging for a day as I all my energy has been directed trying to get the IB50 sorted out. A very kind lady who supports me in my voluntary work helped me with it. She has experience of filling in these forms and said she would also send a supporting letter with it as well, she even said she would go to a medical as well which is really helpful.

I have another meeting tomorrow, hopefully I can get the end section of the IB50 all done and get it all sent back and wait to see if I have to go to a medical then.

It doesn't matter what you write in these forms if you don't fit in the right boxes they still want you to go to a medical just to make sure you haven't magically recovered. I was reading some notes from a neuro psychologist from 14 years ago and the day to day problems are pretty much the same now as they were then, unfortunately brain injures have this effect.

The DWP don't care what effect sending these forms to you has on your health. all that is important to them is getting another person off Incapacity benefit and down the jobcentre.

I would love to be how I was before the head injury and go to work properly but it is never going to happen. the government seem to think that disabled and sick people are all going to get jobs and we are all going to feel jolly and happy but I don't think they see the bigger picture

This is like the Arbeit Macht Frei effect. I am thinking quite negative after my experience at the working links office [still haven't heard from the DEA whether what Working Links told me is correct] and thinking what employer would want to take the risk with me with my conditions. I was talking to the lady helping me with the IB50 and it looks like I am a ticking bomb.

I have had some uncomfortable situations at my voluntary work previously and I have been to see one of the people who supports me and got a solution. When I had the part-time work in 1997 whenever I had a problem it was like it was always my fault because of my head injury and it was like always thrown back at me.

I have been worrying about getting the brown envelope for the last few months and now I have got one I have felt dreadful for over a week. I feel like I have had what energy I had drained out of me. I feel down but I don't feel depressed. It is difficult to feel positive at this moment in time with the IB50 hanging over my head. I was doing ok but now the brown envelope has come I am having a big anxiety problem more than usual, a letter come through the post about the tax credits and when I saw it I started feeling sick and then I was shaking later on. I am thinking about going to the GP and see if I can get anything done about it, It is a horrible feeling.

Shall I jump now or I wait until I am pushed?

What a lovely morning I have just had.

As I said yesterday I would go to Working Links and see what wonderful things they have to offer outcasts like me.

I explained my circumstances, ie on IB but under IB50 review. They said as I am on Incapacity Benefit they can help. I said from previous experience that there is the possibility as I may have to go to a medical soon and I may well end up on JSA. We all like to know the Atos doctors like to reach their targets and get there commission.

In true James Purnell style the receptionist said "we look at what you can do not what you can't". they said they could help me while I am on IB but if I end up on JSA then I am no longer classed as disabled but fit for work, they said that Working Links would not be able to help me but I would have to go to the office upstairs.

This office upstairs is the one that someone has just come through the door slamming it very hardly making me jump and turning me into a nervous wreck, not though that I wasn't a nervous wreck to start off with. How the glass stayed in the door I do not know? I have experienced this effect before at the jobcentre, its no wonder I contact the DEA by email.

It is true what I said before that if the DWP deem you fit for work even if you have a disability then if you end up on JSA your disability doesn't exist anymore.

Working Links said that they could help me for 6 weeks regardless if I sign up now and do I really want to go back to work? I said I would think about it.

I said yes I would love to go to work but I have things which restrict me, you know effects of brain injury. The receptionist said that a consultant/whatever they are called can look at my work history [that's going to be fun] and what type of work I am interested in and even some people have turned hobbies or interests into work. I thought I am not a f***ing imbecile you know.

Just at that moment some council worker walked in off the street and stood virtually next to the receptionist which I found quite intimidating. I gave him my annoyed look and I wanted to ask him if he wanted to listen to every word in my conversation with the receptionist or tell him to p**s off but I left it as I did not feel like my normal jolly self at this juncture.

I was right when I thought it was all a trap. It turns out it is a even bigger trap now than what I first thought.

So where is all this government help to get you back to work? I did not know that it had conditions attached like you have to be on IB.

If you are not on IB but the DWP think you are fit for work even though you are disabled, it looks like you are on your own then.

Shall I jump now or shall I wait until I am pushed?

Working Links

Pre-empting getting a medical and being passed as fit for work I contacted the DEA via email [the wonders of the internet] to find out what options there could be for me

This is the help I can look forward to:

Hello Brainblogger

There is a new programme which started on 28/04/08 called pathways, the sole provider of this programme which has effectively replaced new deal for disabled people are Working Links.

Hopefully this 3 year contract will be more radical in its attempts to help individuals who wish to move off incapacity benefits and back into paid employment.

I think it is unlikely that you will end up on Jobseeker’s Allowance or in some low paid employment, the aim is to make you better off in work financially, not worse off, as this is counter-productive.

Your health condition is still treated as a disability under the DDA.

Thanks

DEA



To me it basically looks like the jobcentre ain't bothered and would rather just farm me off to Working Links. I have not read good things about working links. It does not fill me with confidence.

Shall I go to working links in town and see what they have to say making sure I do not sign my life away and report back on my blog?. What do you think fellow bloggers?

How reassuring it is to know that my health condition is covered by the DDA,

My Philosophy is that the government don't give a monkeys what I want in terms of a career and as long as they get me off the Incapacity Benefit books and start collecting the savings.

Since my head injury I have not had a full-time job and my cv only has periods where I did therapeutic work [now permitted work], does therapeutic work count, part-time work filing catalogues and then the rest is voluntary work and then littered with gaps where I have been in hospital and done rehabilitation etc. I am sure my CV will be appealing to any future employer even though I did get help to do a groovy new CV.

When I left hospital all I did was go back to the Neuropsychologist every few weeks and then months and then three months etc, with numerous visits to the GP to get super headache tablets. you can see where this going.

I did try and go to back to my job again at the carpet distributor [this was one of my 3 jobs before the accident], critics of people on IB please note: I wanted to go back to work even though I only been out of hospital a few weeks and it was blatantly obvious to everyone except me that I wasn't well enough to go to work

I think at work the people in the office were all very nice to my face but I think they saw the mess I was in and it was all going to end in tears and trying to work wasn't going to last much longer. This was due to the fact I could not remember things , one side of my face was paralysed, [try eating roast dinner when one side of your face is paralysed] speaking was also a problem as I could not think of the words and I would get really frustrated. This is all typical effects of a brain injury. If I was an animal they would have put me down.

One morning I received a letter through the post & a P45 from the M.D after being on sick pay for a while basically giving me the boot suggesting I should get an alternative source of income from the government. No we wish you get well soon or anything, the heartless bastards [excuse my language]. I am not embarrassed to say but I literally cried my eyes out for hours.

I suddenly found I had a lot of time on my hands. I remember going to a special needs centre in town but there was no Jeremy Kyle then it was Kilroy

This is when I first met Incapacity Benefit but it wasn't called IB then I think it was called Sickness Benefit or something like that.

Where did it all go wrong?. If there had been proper support to start off with I would not have ended up in this situation.

Radical attempts to get people back to work, we have heard all about the radical attempts to get people back to work.

Did there not used to be a green card system many moons ago and employers had to have a quota of green card workers? I don't know where that came from but that's been in my brain swimming around.

How am I going to be better off in work financially when I do not have the capacity to work full-time?. This is where people like me feel anxious about finding work and plunging into the labour market.

I still feel trapped and I still have a IB50 to fill in. 23 days still to go

Light Bulbs

Are the 4 free energy efficient light bulbs I received today from British Gas somehow supposed to help me save some money and make me feel better about the environment ?.

I don't think so, it is really more like the give with one hand and take with the other hand effect while they rob you blind with the rip off prices of the gas and electricity. I have been buying energy saving light bulbs for years now and I can't say it makes much difference to my bills because they keep going up anyway so why not just have cheap and cheerful light bulbs.

What am I going to do when I can't afford the electricity to put the TV on to watch Jeremy Kyle?, oh now, I have managed to slip Jeremy in again. I really need some therapy.

Will I have time to watch Jeremy Kyle when I will be out collecting litter, cleaning graffiti or helping change old folks incontinence pads?. I have nothing against old folks because they are lovely people but changing incontinence pads doesn't really appeal to me as a future career.

Money saving ideas here exclusively on How can you take it easy when you are already taking it easy.

I changed my mind since what I wrote earlier. I never used to be this cynical. Was it the bang on the head or is it putting up with years of government inflicted torture that's done it?.

For the vast majority, ESA “will be a temporary benefit, not a permanent snare”.

James Purnell said "For the vast majority, ESA “will be a temporary benefit, not a permanent snare”.

Right so where does that apply to me then?. That's of course if I can survive the IB50 and possible medical which I am sure I will have to go to.

Allegedly the Employment and Support Allowance is supposed to be a temporary benefit between getting a job, however this is unworkable for lots of disabled people. ie, with a traumatic brain injury the effects that you are left with get better to a point [its called a plateau] but you are left with the damage for the rest of your life and you just have to cope. There isn't a magic fix. A lot of disabled people feel under threat.

I do voluntary work in the idea that I will build myself up so I am well enough to work full-time, this is my dream. However I am never going to get to the levels I was at before my head injury however hard I try.

Voluntary work is good for you if you get in the right place with the right support. It can help you build up your confidence and self-esteem.

I feel sorry for the people who after two years on JSA who will be doing community work to get their benefits. Collecting litter and cleaning graffiti will not be good for their self-esteem as people feel low enough already with being tarred as scroungers and cheats.

Will unemployed/disabled people have to wear orange suits or something else the government sees fit to humiliate them?.

Why can't disabled people get better jobs?. What sort of career can one look forward to?. What sort of earning potential do I have?. It makes me feel depressed looking through the jobs never seeing anything that looks stimulating and the jobs that say that they pay more than minimum wage [That's the £5.52 I was talking about in my first post]

In the town where I live it makes me angry when I see disabled people at work, two in particular, I see this poor girl who doesn't look very happy working in a well known burger chain [the one that does hardly anything for vegetarians, don't get me started] cleaning tables and mopping the floor and cleaning the toilets and all the shit jobs. I have never seen her working behind the counter serving the customers

I want to ask her does she enjoy her job?. What does she feel? Are there any career prospects in cleaning tables and refilling the tomato sauce pots?.

There's this guy who works in a large DIY store who constantly goes round the car park collecting trolleys. I think what sort of career prospects is there in collecting trolleys or does he have to feel grateful that he has a job?

Is this all the jobs that disabled people are worth doing? Perhaps I have just had a sheltered life and don't meet up with all the disabled people working in all the high flying jobs

The place where I worked at for a short time where I ended up filing magazines, the people said to me how you should be grateful that you have a job here, and when I went off for a couple of weeks for some rehabilitation that they would hold my job for me. How reassuring.

Have things changed since 1998?.

From my own experience if given the opportunity, disabled people can be hard working, motivated individuals.

People need to feel valued and not just being pushed into low paid crap jobs just so it makes government figures look good, then it makes you wonder why people like me rely on IB when the jobs out there aren't very attractive and the pay is less than IB.

However James Purnell will soon put that to an end with the introduction of ESA and we can all look forward to harsher medicals [even though they are harsh enough already] and visits to the Jobcentre to sign on for for JSA.

If in the meantime if Labour are voted out, the Conservatives aren't much better either. Our government want you to be poorer even though you haven't got the capacity to be able to work full-time

I am trying to remain positive but its difficult when you feel under threat every day.

Brainblogger

Brown Envelope Day

As I predicted I have received my brown envelope yesterday with a IB50 old style questionnaire. Perhaps somebody has been reading my blog. I have been preparing myself for this moment for months. Now I have got over the shock, here's how it looks to me.

This is the form from previous experience that asks next to nothing about things involved with a brain injury, The questions relate more physical things, ie: walking, lifting, sitting down, toilet needs etc. Anything relating to a brain injury has to fitted in at the end next to the mental section. From previous experience pretty much whatever I fill in will end up with me going for a medical.

This is when I end up going to the place where they do the medicals which I dislike intensely and which makes me very anxious and my blood pressure goes into orbit. Then at the same time I have to be able to remember all the things I want to tell the doctor while I am feeling very anxious which is not an easy thing to do.

Here are some possible scenarios how I see it:

scenario 1:

fill in form, get no medical. Carry on voluntary work trying to get myself magically fit again, get away from Jeremy Kyle. See what Jobcentre can do to help, you are having a laugh aren't you?. Jobcentre pack me off onto pathways or whatever it is called to practice writing my c.v again [not that anybody takes any notice of your qualifications on your cv when you are damaged goods] and look for non-existent jobs on computer at college. Jobcentre makes unemployment figures look good because you are officialy not on IB. Then get another medical after 2010 and end up on ESA or JSA anyway.

scenario 2:

Fill in IB50, get medical, try and convince doctor if doctor actually listens that you are actually ill and these things it says in GP notes and hospital notes did actually happen and you are not making it up as you go along. Even though you know all along the doctor has to meet his targets and doctor is already thinking in his mind that you look a surefire bet to add to his magically fit for work list.

Scenario 3

Fill in IB50, get medical, pass medical as fit for work, apply for JSA and appeal against medical decision [6 months min] JSA is means tested, get no JSA due to other circumstances except stamp [live off savings] I have done this before when I appealed last time and it is not very pleasant.

The nice people at the Jobcentre tell you not to bother to come in and sign on when you are appealing, thy did the last time anyway. And I thought Jobcentre might help me to find a job paying £20000 a year while I was appealing and forget all this incapacity benefit malarky.

Scenario 4:

Fill in IB50, get medical, pass medical as fit for work, don't bother appealing, get JSA as above, look for a job

Scenario 5:

Don't bother returning form, This is what our caring government wants us all to do, Get a job/part-time job packing soap, filling shelves and claim tax credits. But then make yourself ill in the process because you were only kidding yourself when you thought you were well enough to go back to work again. Go to doctors do not pass go with out collecting prescription for Seroxat.

Scenario 6:

Find a magic cure for brain injury, take magic cure, I thought there would have been a cure coming through with all my spam I get, stop moaning, go back to work and live happily ever after as if you have been living in some dream world for last 18 years.

That's my thoughts for today, now I have got to build myself up to try and fill this damn form in. now do I have any problem controlling my bowels or my bladder?.

Trapped by Labours Arbeit Macht Frei

This is my first attempt at a blog so It might be a bit rough round the edges.

I got the name how can you take it easy when you are already taking it easy from an unhelpful ex-stepmother/drama queen/control freak who regularly accused me of being a scrounger and how there was nothing wrong with me and how her Daughter was always more ill than me.

One week I said I was having some time off from voluntary work and she said "How can you take it easy when you are already taking it easy?"

I had a brain injury in a road accident 18 years ago, prior to that I was quite happy with my 3 jobs working 55 hours+. I liked my jobs, I liked working hard. I have been on and off incapacity benefit for easily 16/17 years. I am not proud of it but it has helped me survive. One has to survive on something. As I have been reading today some people think that you should get food vouchers instead of Incapacity Benefit. How are you going to be able to pay your council tax with food vouchers and think about how embarrassing it will be going to pay for your shopping in Aldi with food vouchers?.

One day I woke up in hospital after being on a life support machine I am told with the mother of all headaches [imagine eating ice-cream too fast and getting brain freeze but 50 times worse] wondering how the hell did I get here and what's happened to my motorbike and what happened to my chicken curry I was going to eat when I got home. apparently a car pulled in front of me and I hit it and I flew over the top, not that I can actually remember it. I remember leaving work and going to get a take-away curry on the way home and that's about it.

After the head injury I was told I would never work again. I always kept saying to myself when I am well enough to go to work again I will hope to get back to where I was but you will find with brain injuries don't work like that.

18 years on after going through various hospitals, therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, occupational therapy, you get the picture by now. I have been to these so called therapeutic schemes not that were very therapeutic. I can not forget the last place I actually worked therapeutically and then part-time for a very short time. From day to day I felt like I was being kept wrapped up in cotton wool all the time, now are you sure you can manage that as if I was an imbecile. I was moved around from one office to the other because they did not know how to manage someone like me on a day to day basis. Some days I would have good days and some days I had dreadful days. I ending up working in a drawing office entering data onto a computer from drawings which I quite enjoyed and was quite straightforward.

A new computer system arrived but I was not given the training despite asking on numerous occasions and my job went to the tart down the corridor. My new role was to cut up drawings or making cups of tea or just sit at my desk doing nothing hoping somebody could think up something for me to do. The office manager who had no idea of managing people regularly patted me on the back like I was a child at school. One day I had sorted out all these magazines and files in the cabinet by the office that no-one give a shit about and I was made to feel as if I was doing something really important when in fact it wasn't. My self-esteem dropped to zero and I felt truly depressed. Shortly after this I left. I think what this is called now is constructive dismissal. After visiting the doctors I made a new friend called Seroxat who was my friend for nearly ten years.

I can remember going to the job centre and the DEA asking me if I wanted to go to a place to pack soap for £20 a week. How stimulating for the brain I thought? Its now called permitted work now and it still doesn't work especially when it is limited to just a year. I didn't go packing soap but I started volunteering at an old folks home instead until they started messing me about.

After surviving all that now in 2005 the DEA said I should go to this place to help me get back to work and how it had helped other people with head injuries to get back to work, this I did for 8 months going backwards and forwards on the train to a place in Birmingham, the travelling was exhausting in itself on the worlds slowest train to Birmingham following the train that stopped at every station between Coventry and Birmingham . The disability employment advisor from the jobcentre was invited twice to meet up in Birmingham and see how I was doing but he never came, got the usual lame excuse, stuck in a meeting, perhaps he didn't care or perhaps he was just too busy playing golf.

When I was finally in the right frame of mind the people from Birmingham got me a work placement to get me back into a work environment. I was supposed to be there for 2 weeks which was extended to 6 weeks. After the 6 weeks I said could I stay as a volunteer to try and build up my mental stamina which was agreed. it was nice to get out of the house and meet people and get away from Jeremy Kyle, you know as all us incapacity benefit scroungers do. I wish I never heard of Jeremy Kyle but his name crops up a lot in my day to day life. The people who got me the placement saw me twice more and never followed up or tracked my progress and effectively dumped me there. I phoned up about my case and they said my case was closed and all I got was a certificate not worth the paper its written on, how I haven't put it in the shredder yet I do not know. I suppose it will have some use in the future, my children could have it for drawing on perhaps. Thank you guys but what was the point of that and how much was the cheque from the jobcentre by the way?

I feel let down because I am no nearer to getting a job as I was then although I have over 3 years experience as a volunteer now, nobody tracks my progress other than the supervisor/people I work with. The Jobcentre says the place where I am doing my voluntary work are taking advantage of me and should give me a job, not the fact I am in a working environment trying to build myself up.


How many times did the DEA say he was going to see me or he was going to send leaflets about permitted work to my supervisor or go up and explain about this scheme or that. I am still waiting. Not that you can see a DEA now because you have to pre-book. If the jobcentre are so keen to get sick people back to work I would of thought the jobcentre would be inviting you there and greeting you with glasses of champagne not making you pre-book.
I avoid the jobcentre because they are so negative towards me and what I am doing.

Why is it when you go to the jobcentre you have to get past the SS guards at the reception, you can not actually just go in and see someone. Did the people working at reception give up the day job working as wardresses at Auschwitz or something?.

Here I am 3 and a half years later still working as a volunteer. I love it and the people are all very nice and the support is fantastic. A couple of weeks ago I won an award for my commitment as a volunteer which I am thrilled to bits about.

I have asked if there are any vacancies that would be suitable for me for what I am doing. However we agree that as I would only be able to work part-time [as I am not well enough to work full-time, no magic cure for brain injury yet] it would be pointless. I now live in dread every day of the brown envelope with an IB50 coming or whatever it is called these days or a phone call for a medical. It's like government inflicted torture. I haven't had a medical in 3 years, last time I had a medical the clueless doctor said in his report that as I could watch tv [too much watching Jeremy Kyle as all us scroungers/criminals/fraudsters do] and as I can read the paper and fill the dishwasher as if by magic I am fit for work when I still have restrictions, can't remember how many months it took but I appealed and had IB reinstated with points to spare.

Fast forward to July 2008 Mr Purnell with his own version of Arbeit Macht Frei. work will make you free, no I mean work will make you feel better, not when you are worse off it won't make you feel better. With the withdrawal of age additions and money for dependants our caring government will make you worse off, that's of course if I am disabled enough to get on employment support allowance and not end up on jobseekers allowance where my disability won't exist anymore. That's a nightmare I am already contemplating.

I am sure the collecting litter and cleaning graffiti from walls will do wonders for ones self-esteem as if it isn't low enough already. Are there any career prospects in collecting litter?. a promotion to chief litter picker from £5.50 a week to £5.52 a week, it is disguised by saying that the rate of pay exceeds minimal wage when it might only 2p more than minimum wage.

Back to the plot where am I going to find a part-time job that will pay me full-time wages?.

I don't qualify for disability working tax credits either so I am penalised that way as well because of other circumstances. If I do get a part-time job I will be working for a pittance. If I could work full-time I would but I am restricted by my brain telling me its time to pack up and have a sleep usually by getting the headache is the first indicator.

In the current state of the UK employment where are all the jobs for the disabled going to come from?. Who is going to convince the employers to give disabled people jobs?. They don't do it now despite the DDA so they are not going to change there mind overnight. I have applied for jobs and I felt that I was one of the best candidates but I get turned down after an interview with lame excuses, that's of course if you get an interview to start off with. Just mention you have epilepsy or that you have an brain injury I suddenly have a mental illness and they would rather not take the risk, bye bye any chance of an interview.

Whoever thought this reform through didn't think it through properly, the red-top readers will be happy but it will actually penalise sick people more than the scroungers. Today I read this: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/money/article910854.ece

Apparently we are all cheats now and basically being tarred with the same brush, how convenient for the government.

I am trying so so hard to overcome my disability but feel like I am trapped.