ESA benefit changes – how will it affect me?

I started writing on this topic and the post became too long, so I’m splitting it.  I am one person, affected by a welfare benefits overhaul, who doesn’t know how to feel yet.  So, first part:

There is a massive change in welfare benefits in the UK at the moment, which is of concern to anyone who is already claiming sickness related benefits or will shortly need to.

If you are in the process of being assessed or wish to download the forms and information guides, then the dwp website has the links if you click—–> here.

Since there is the whole country to get through, people must feel the impact, for good or bad, at staggered times.

It’s my turn to be staggered.

Well, I completed the limited capability for work form, within the month, as required.  I then awaited for the results.

A few days ago I got the decision letter telling me that I had been placed in the work related activity group (as opposed to the ’support’ group, which is reserved for those with limited capability for work related activity - KEEP UP, WILL YOU, this stuff is reviting.  I’m about to RIVET you.

 I was totally anxious when I got that letter.  I’ve not had time to read through the time-consuming, dreary particulars, which I am endeavouring to do, one clause at a time, but it really set me in a tail spin of anxiety when it hit me that I knew nothing about the new structure.

The greatest fear comes from simply not knowing.

I only knew the true extent of my not-knowing, when I received the decision letter, which helped to clarify that I was in a very vague category, with vague responsibilities to attend and take part in job focused interviews (or my benefit could be affected).  That last part was pretty clear.

Phrases like taking reasonable steps, seeing a job focused adviser at regular intervals rang out crystal clear, like piccolo song across a frosty lake.

Depression Poem

Depression seeps through

And, for

A Moment

Is terrifying.

 

Fortunately

The especial type of terror

Lasts but 

 

A Moment

 

Unfortunately

Depression has an eclectic taste

In Terror

The next 

 

Moment

 

Filled, as expertly

As the former.

 

Grab on to something

Lest you be consumed.

I’m attending Bestival (and I’m nervous as hell)

First of all, it’s been ages since my last post.  The reason is I had enough with repeating myself (“I’m depressed today” “I’m super depressed today” “I’m anxious today“

So I made a pact to post only when something different was going on…

I return via doing a google search for Disabilities physical and mental and surviving a festival.  I found this post by zarathustra on the MIND website.

I remember the name from Mental Nurse, which I think has disbanded now, but was sort of nice to see the familiar names

Anyway, this will be short.

All summer I’ve had the goal of attending a festival.  I was dissuaded on my first mission by well-meaning friends who said I was mad to spend that much for three days, so I sold the ticket.  Well, if I’m mad anyway, and I do a mad thing, don’t two positives or negatives cancel eachother out? (dim memory of mathmatical logic).

Anyway, Bestival is the only one left.  I have my ticket and am going alone.  I am scared and determined and we’ll see how it goes…

ANXIETY WITH NO CAUSE

I have been soo anxious today.  I’m putting it down to a bit of agoraphobia following a period of confinement indoors.  First I was ill, after the aerobics, then I just feel like I’m faltering a bit lately.  There are days when I’m in a low mood and don’t want to do anything.  Today I went out for a reeeeallly short gym session.  I went for that option because I couldn’t come up with any other ideas on the spot.

When one has been indoors for a few days, the outside world no longer feels ‘normal’.  It’s a scary place with “lions and tigers and bears… Oh My!!  Lions and tigers and bears, oh my..” (film reference in case you were unaware

It really is.  It’s a place with loud noises, bright lights and sensory overload.

I guess it’s generalized anxiety, as it has no particular focus.  I just knew I had to do something and the gym has been a bit scary since I’ve associated it with the last episode, when I did too much physical exertion and felt ill for a few days.  I didn’t want to let 2,3,4 weeks pass without going because I knew I’d end up building it up in my head.

I just feel constant anxiety today that hasn’t gone even after the out-of-house experience.  What is anxiety like?  It’s like being boxed in to a small space.  It’s like having a hundred sentences starting in your head, and before any single sentence is illuminated another has come to take its place.  It’s total body takeover – churning stomach, nerves scrambling, muscles tense.  It’s wanting to throw up, feeling sick and nauseous.

I dislike anxiety intensely, especially when it causes my system to be overloaded with unusable stress hormones and doesn’t ‘come down’.  My experience is one of being stewed in juices, a cauldron of cortisol and its cohorts.  I know the ropes.  When my system is ‘up’ like this, those churning feelings take their course, eventually dying away to be replaced with physical/mental exhaustion.

I’m glad I did bite the bullet and go – I may suffer a bit while I recover my equilibrium.

A success/other people’s opinions

First of all, I have a success to report – i DID my observed teaching thing.  I was ultra nervous, and have felt quite ill for a few days after, but, nevertheless, I did it.  I had the audio go haywire so coudln’t show my film clips properly, so thank goodness it wasn’t a job interview!!

I’chose to do mine on anthropology, specifically study of cultural sameness and difference observed.  I was also intrigued by the Japan effect – calm cool orderly queueing for food, whereas Haiti had police all round, the food line could not have worked in that environ without police/military control.

I was trying to keep the subject tangible and there’s not a lot more topical than Japan right now.

I’ve been ill ever since, though I’m slowly feeling better – on wednesday I could not stop crying – it was a little program called “lark Rise To Candleford” which started it off.  LRTC is a Sunday Scheduler’s wet dream – whimsy, period gowns, genteel behaviour and lots of roaming amongst fields I wish I had newrby.

Anyway, the other peoples’ opininons thing was just that I’ve been told off by someone younger than me for buying expencsive tickets to a festival.  Granted they are bloody expensive, but why people suddenly think it’s their duty to dish out stern warnings, is beyond me.

Part of being ill seems to be your own desires and wants are questioned and even just thinking about this kind of Victorian “This is how money should be spent…” has my toes curling and my stomach backing up into my ribcage.

I havne’t slept a wink tonight so no doubt I’m not in a fully decisive aspect.

An almost crash

I feel…weird.  Pent up, tense, low moody.

I have an assessment thing on Monday for a course I’m doing – a group presentation that scares me because I’m an anxious little bunny.  Is that why I feel weird?

Or is it because my friend cancelled our meet up today and I, in some way am feeling the withdrawal from psyching myself up to be all social and now…nothing….?

It might be all of the above, plus the fact I nearly crashed the car today.  It was a roundabout deal – I think I assumed that the car in front was going through the lights, when in fact there was a q in front of her so she had stopped.  I only realised this as my heart pinched with terror when I glanced up and saw the backside of her vehicle advancing towards my bumper (though obviously it was I who was moving).  I did an emergency brake the like of which I hope I never have to do again.

My car (and it’s not even my car) stopped dead an inch before her back end.  You know how people say their lives flash before them when they are in an accident.  Well, I could say, rather, that my motoring future flashed before me in those few seconds.  I thought “points on my licence; insurance going through the roof; parental ire; awkward apologies to other driver, followed by information exchange and witnesses to bear against my driving…”

And then, amazingly, the foot that had floored the brake did its job.  The jolt I was expecting came only from my own car’s quick-stop.

I was only a few minutes from home so I drove the rest of the way with adrenalin coursing through my veins.  I told myself off for letting thoughts, or reaching for a drink, or whatever it was that lost my attention, get in the way.

The thing is I’m very sensitive.  In the old days people used to say it was their “nerves” they had trouble with.  Now they’d probably call it anxiety.  I am so sensitively drawn though, so that stuff like this doesn’t just brush off in half an hour.  My system stays on active alert for useless hours.

A glass of wine with my dinner hasn’t really helped.  It seems to have a depressant effect on me.

I don’t know what is wrong, but I feel really weird now.

Still here, kind of

 

I have come to realise that I only write a diary/this blog when I feel less than OK.  I suppose I’m just not one of those people who has the urge to write about their lives when they are just about getting by or better.

With that introduction, I will remain true to form and say, I don’t feel great.  I’m just about half way through a course about teaching to adults and it’s hitting my energy pretty hard.  I just want to get to the end and not have to drop out due to health problems.  It’s one step at a time for now.

I’ve loads I could tell you (‘you’ being ‘diary’ but diary being anyone with an internet connection and the desire to use it bluesilk-illy) but for now it escapes me.  Bit of a void.

I don’t know if I am here half the time – whether that’s an amytriptiline thing or a general tired zombie thing I couldn’t say.

The things that help me get through the bad days at the moment are

a. doing things one step at a time

b. browsing the internet for all the exotic holidays I want to be on

I’m still here, kind of

Better days to come digits crossed.

 

A Life, unsorted

 

I’m pushing forward when I feel able.  I’m pushing against a gust of wind or a steel container that is heavy, cumbersome.  Some days are easier.

I had a mis-spent youth.  It was mis-spent trying to be practically perfect in every way.  I had few friends, stunted emotional development, but bloody fantastic grades.  I’ve been trying to make up for my mis-spent youth ever since the age of 22.

When my twenties ended, amidst much hysterical life-assessment, I vowed I would try to get myself out of this hole I’m in.  This involves change.  Change is scary.  So, I vowed to start with easier tasks.

Firstly, I thought it absolutely paramount that I start smoking.

..Okay, let me put some hair on that bald statement, which, if left hanging there, looks like a bit of a lunatic scheme.  To clarify, I thought it paramount that I start doing things which I’ve not done before, through lack of opportunity or lack of the correct amount of teen rebellion.

So, I bought ten cigs from the supermarket and smoked them.  It took about three weeks to get through them, but it ticked off one of my ‘not done it before’ tasks.  I have dragged on cigarettes whilst drunk, but never ‘learnt’ to smoke.  Cue much coughing, failed lighting attempts, soggy filters and proclamations that “I’m crap at this smoking lark!”  Got the hang of it by the tenth, though.

Also, been on the date previously mentioned.  Haven’t had a boyfriend for a couple of years – I find men scary, and dates, therefore, feel like I’m voluntarily strapping myself into a chair, whilst watching a tornado heading straight in my direction, as thousands of right-minded, screaming people run in the opposite direction.  Some might think I’m a little phobic…

The date seemed to go okay and we’ve had a phone conversation since, which, again, seemed to go okay.  You can never tell though, can you?  I am sooo rubbish at just relaxing into a phone conversation without dissecting what the other person’s thinking.  No wonder I find them exhausting.  We have arranged a second date – I have thus far studiously avoided the use of the word ‘date’ in conversation/texts with this man, but that is what it is – so all I can do is try to relax about it as much as possible.

I think I need to go on loads of dates just to get this date phobia out of my system.  But I don’t know how to find lots of people willing to ask me out on dates so I can practice getting less stressed. 

Anyhoo, relationships only one side of a many-sided polygon.  I also need to address my health, my spiritual disharmony, my living arrangements, my wealth deficit and my intellectual boredom.  No small task is it.  I’ll update if anything major occurs. 

Be well xx

Identity Theft

 

For once this is exactly what it says on the tin.  I’m talking literally.  I have never before been the victim of identity theft, but a few days ago my credit/c company phoned me to ask about a suspicious transaction.  It was over a grand.  They hadn’t let it go through so there was no real harm and they cancelled the card and are sending a new one.  I thought that was the end of it.

Then, yesterday, I go to the ATM to draw some money on my other c/c (I only have the two and use them for small transactions).  Machine tells me “insufficient funds”.  Now my heart starts to race because I’ve not spent anywhere near my limit and the first incident suddenly looks much more ominous.

I get home and log on to my account.  It’s in the minus.  One transaction near £2000 and another, as yet not gone through, for a similar amount.  The second one has probably not been authorised because my credit limit is really not that high, but my account has big red letters ordering me to pay immediately.

I’ve phoned the second c/c and explained it so it’s logged now, but I have no idea what happens in these cases.  I’m feeling stressed about it because a) I don’t know if it is a straightforward process to get the 2nd company to believe I didn’t order the transaction (it was a balance transfer) and b) this isn’t just one random breach on one card – it’s someone who has my details and knows where I have credit.  This freaks me out because I can’t think how someone would get that information.

I now have no credit as my cards are cancelled, but I’m more concerned to know how it happened and if I need to do something to stop it happening again.  I shred my post, but I do a lot of internet shopping, so whether that’s to blame???

I’m trying not to get panicked but I feel a little violated and I don’t really know of anyone else who this has happened to.

My Dentist (phobia?)- part 2

 

So, after the botch-up on Wednesday (described in the last post) I was given an appointment for this week to go back to get a new inlay fitted on my root canal treated tooth.

Just because I love the visual, please welcome back, *American talk show host accent*

“Misterrrr Drill and Fill”

The reason I made a part 2 to this post is that something happened on Friday.  The something that happened is my temporary filling remained true to its calling.  It turned out, not only to be temporary, but also temperamental, refusing to last until my next appointment.  Couldn’t last seven days.

It is a different kind of filling to last time, which was also a temp, but this new one doesn’t have to be drilled out.  According to Dentist he ‘just flicks this one out’ – no drilling – YAY.  Except…

it suffers from premature ejection.  A very embarrassing condition for any filling.

I was eating a salad.  I thought an olive pip had found its way past the pitting machine, as I bit something hard.  Retrieving the object I realise with horror it is my ‘just flicks out’ filling.  Thank God I was at home.  I still had a freak-out, though. 

The prematurely-ejecting filling is white, hard, and rather large.  It looks and feels quite toothy, probably because there’s not much of my original molar left above the gum line, so the position the temp was filling in for was a central, executive position.  Lots of stress.  Like filling in for Richard Branson, maybe, while he’s pissing about in a hot air balloon.

Anyhoo, I get a bit stressed, “ohmygod,ohmygod,ohmygod”, holding the temp in my shaking hand.  I swear I didn’t used to be phobic about dental stuff.  I’ve had two dubious dentists, a few bad experiences, and now I’m a mess around them all.

My molar without the filling resembles a castle ruin.  I’ve got my next appointment tomorrow morning – eeeeeeek!!!

I’m sweating right now.  I feel sick.  I’m so bloody anxious and my stomach is turning over.  Occasionally the rational side of my brain hazards a know-it-all comment, “there’s nothing to be this scared about”, “get a grip”, “maybe you should just think exactly what it is that’s making you anxious and work from there”.

I’m anxious because I associate him with pain, discomfort and dodgy technique.  I’m also annoyed because every time I have to do something that is anxiety-provoking, it knackers me afterwards.

Anyway, as a side dish, I was thinking about whether I have “dental phobia”.  I don’t think I do, you know.  For me, a phobia involves a few things:

• avoidance of the feared situation
• disproportionate fear about the situation/thing
• physical and/or psychological disturbance around the object of ones phobia.

I don’t avoid going to the dentist – I may have been guilty of postponing in the past, but if necessary I go.

I do have a disproportionate fear about going.  I mean, my fight or flight response is in full-swing, and really this much adrenalin should only be released if one is in imminent danger of being hit by a bus.  BUT, although disproportionate, the fear isn’t totally unfounded.  I have had several reasons to be wary of my dentist, and he has caused me discomfort and made dubious decisions (for instance, he waited until I was in agony before doing an emergency root canal treatment, rather than reacting to the increasing pain I’d told him about).  So, although my anxiety is excessive, I think some anxiety would be rational.

I do, obviously, have butt-loads of psychological and physical disturbance both in anticipation of my dental procedure and whilst having anything done.

So, I hit two out of three for the phobia criteria (of my own devising, not DSM or anything).  I think I have a huge fear about being treated by this particular dentist.  But, I think that if I had a good experience with my next dentist (I’m definitely changing practices after this gets sorted) my fear would markedly diminish.

This is all drivel in terms of it wasn’t really necessary for me to write or analyze it, but I’m SHIT-SCARED so I suppose writing it down is my way of coping with/dispersing the fear.