10 June 2012

The Darkness Comes Again.

This morning I awoke feeling ok really, but as the hours have passed I've felt a bout of depression beginning again. I have no anti-depressants and can't get any until tomorrow, so there is no relief.

It is hard to describe how it feels, it's like all the hope is going, there is no hope only futility. I try to cling onto hope as when it is gone there is nothing and that's when the crying begins. You can't stop the tears and when people say "why are you crying?" There is no answer so I hide from people. It distresses or angers people when they can't help you and they can't understand what is wrong with you.

I've had my letter telling me I have to go for my "The computer says no" medical, which will not take into account my mental illness. There is nothing they can do to help me when I am like this so I don't get sectioned you see. If they could quantify and attempt to relieve my symptoms they could treat me in hospital, but as they can't I am by many not considered to have such a high degree of need, ironically if I committed suicide today I'd qualify for help tomorrow is the way it is for women like me.

 I have been expecting to have to go for this medical ever since Labour announced the proposed changes to disability benefits, and that income support (the benefit I receive) was to be phased out). It took them longer than they expected and the government has changed to a more heartless Tory Lib Dem coalition, but we are all receiving the pink form and the letters now. There are many of us who don't know what we will do when we are declared fit to work despite our illness not having changed at all and despite not having worked for many years, some of us have never worked in our lives. I have been doing voluntary work and studying for three years now in preparation for this moment, I even tried applying for jobs, jumping before I was pushed so to speak. The futility of it drove me mad, you rarely receive any form of reply there are so many people applying for these jobs. I've got no work history for the past ten years, I do 2 days a week in a bookshop at a local abbey which I have done for three years and now know my boss very well, so at least I can get a reference. Many people I know have no one to ask for a reference, you need two references to apply for a job stacking shelves in Iceland these days. Of all the people being forced to take mandatory work experience I wonder how many of them will actually be given a contact when they leave so they can ask for a reference, probably not many. I know people sent on these placements, they are told from the outset there is no job for them, probably because the job center sends so many people who work for free. They are treated like dogsbodys and are not trained in anything as far as I can see.

So all of us thousands of people who's medical condition has not changed are now expected to apply for the same jobs as the able bodied people who have been recently made unemployed. There are not enough jobs for them even in this current economic climate it seems, yet they are adding thousands more people to this pool everyday.

They have picked the worst possible time to have decided to do this, other countries increase welfare spending in times of economic crisis, not our government though. They let the richest people in the country evade tax while the poorest lose what little they ever had, and people who never suffered poverty before are feeling it's cruel bite now too.

You can see how it is hard to cling to hope when I see all this happening on a daily basis, but I must as without hope there is nothing. We are hearing they starting to realise and even admit welfare reforms are not working and are flawed, too late for the people who are already declared fit for work by the flawed system, and those being declared fit every day until they actually halt the reforms and review what they have done. I can only hope that by some miracle I will find employment, and where I live it will truly be a miracle as unemployment is incredibly high all the time anyway. Or maybe my endeavors to make money on line will finally start to pay off, I'm feeling a bit more hopeful about what I'm doing now, but it happens slowly there's now way to speed it up and there is so little time left.

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