Keeping My Head Above Water

Just when you manage to keep your head above water for a little while, a massive pigeon comes and craps all over it. Well, that’s the case in my life it seems anyway. I have been struggling desperately with my financial situation for a while. Not being able to work because of being so poorly, trying to find work, unsuccessfully when I felt a bit better only to come to the conclusion that no one wanted to give me a job, only the jobs I couldn’t do because of my condition.

So I took a stand, worked bloody hard and set up on my own, a business which I could manage and working for myself means I can work as and when I am well enough to. I still cannot afford to take a wage, that will come eventually, but that’s the gamble I had to take if I ever wanted to try and gain some independence and get back into working life. So I find it incredibly hard to swallow that a letter landed on my doorstep from those buffoons in government today telling me I might not be getting any more financial help with my condition because the whole system which is supposed to benefit people who need help, like me, is actually not going to benefit anyone. The whole law is being changed and it’s been coming for a while. Many discussions have been had about what to do with this country’s welfare system and to be honest it's such doom and gloom and there has been so much uncertainty I hadn’t bothered to pay much attention.

I don’t understand or frankly I don’t wish to understand why they think taking money away from those who really need it in order to try and live a normal life as possible is fair. I know it is down to the selfish lazy idiots who reap in the joys of taking what they are not entitled to and the government are trying to make it harder for them but it also makes things harder for us, the people who rely on the measly change we get handed out. The fact is, if I could work a normal job, where I got paid and I lived independently of the government’s hand outs, I bloody well would, and I bloody well did for the years I was healthy before my diagnosis. I paid my taxes, I worked three jobs at a time to get me through uni and I managed to get a bloody good degree. Now I just feel let down. It’s not enough that I’ve had my career prospects and future taken away from me because of this long term disease, but now I fear I will get nothing to help whilst I struggle to make ends meet.

I am in constant fear that because of my condition various aspects of my future will be affected, such as being able to afford a house of my own, or start a family but now I will be in more fear that these things may never happen because I am not quite disabled or suffering enough. How disabled do you have to be to qualify for spare change these days? The last time I looked having to have a hip replaced at 24 was reason enough to think I perhaps need a little help. How much pain and suffering do you have to be in before you are deemed pathetic enough to get a few quid that may mean the difference in being able to pay for your prescriptions? (Oh yes because for some unknown reason someone with a long term CHRONIC condition such as RA that needs medication every day still doesn’t receive free prescriptions) I experience pain and suffering every day of my life. Every single day in one form or another. My whole life has been turned upside down by my diagnosis and all I want to do is to try and stand on my own two feet and be positive about my future. How can I be when I constantly being made to feel like I’m not entitled to help to let me live?

Living in fear and stressing about finances should not be something people with chronic and long term illnesses have to worry about. Is it not enough proof of our ailments with countless letters and evidence written by our doctors in support of our claims? Is it not enough that I spend half my sodding time at hospital appointments or collecting prescriptions or injecting myself or filling out bloody applications for help that you are telling me I am not quite pathetic enough to receive anymore?

This country is going to pot. There is no support for the weak and vulnerable. Only penalisation which is affecting the wrong people. Almost makes me think I should give up, succumb to my pain and be destroyed by it so that I might just be able to afford some shampoo once in a while. But I try, I keep on fighting and people like that should be rewarded and helped along the way for trying to give back to their country. Shame on you the scumbags who sit at home and play on a fake illness so they don’t have to work for a few months and take every penny they can get. You’re alright to sit down the pub all day, though, aren’t you? Where is the people who abuse the systems sense of community or remorse for taking what isn’t theirs? I am grateful for every penny of help I receive because it helps me live from day to day but now things are about to change I wonder how many will be left in poverty or very ill or unable to treat their conditions because of lack of money for medication and a decent quality of life?

This whole issue sickens me to my stomach. I find it hard to sleep at the best of times but with this added financial burden on top of me I worry just what will happen next that targets the vulnerable people in our society.