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.
Thursday 21 August 2008
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?.
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?.
Saturday 9 August 2008
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.
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.
Tuesday 5 August 2008
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.
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.
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