Are you made to feel guilty for claiming benefits?

System

I always feel guilty. Even though i've been assured by those around me (and even the dwp) that i am in need of them. I avoid seeing people as i'm so ashsmed of the fact i'm unwell and unable to work. Like someone else said the first thing people say to you when meeting you is "what do you do?". I hate that question. Truthfully i'm recovering from a serious mental illness and breakdown. But i feel i can't tell people that. There's still so much stigma attached to MI and people tend to run a mile if i say i'm mentally ill.
On the outside i look like a perfectly "normal" healthy 24 year old, but on the inside i'm broken and ill and people don't see that, they just make assumptions that you're fine. I'm too scared to leave the house atm as i think people will see me and think there's nothing wrong. Even though my cpn keeps telling me i need to get out and socialise with people otherwise i'll just end up more and more isolated.
If i could wave a magic wand and take this illness away and be able to work i would in a heartbeat.

jetta_wales

xXMessedUpXx wrote: »

I always feel guilty. Even though i've been assured by those around me (and even the dwp) that i am in need of them. I avoid seeing people as i'm so ashsmed of the fact i'm unwell and unable to work. Like someone else said the first thing people say to you when meeting you is "what do you do?". I hate that question. Truthfully i'm recovering from a serious mental illness and breakdown. But i feel i can't tell people that. There's still so much stigma attached to MI and people tend to run a mile if i say i'm mentally ill.
On the outside i look like a perfectly "normal" healthy 24 year old, but on the inside i'm broken and ill and people don't see that, they just make assumptions that you're fine. I'm too scared to leave the house atm as i think people will see me and think there's nothing wrong. Even though my cpn keeps telling me i need to get out and socialise with people otherwise i'll just end up more and more isolated.
If i could wave a magic wand and take this illness away and be able to work i would in a heartbeat.

Could you just make something up that's more socially understood for when talking to new people?

Nothing extravagant or maybe not even technically a lie but just a good bend of the truth? :-)

I bend the truth all the time when it comes to my sight and strangers it's just easier. If somebody tries to criticise, making the assumption that I don't 'look' dissabled, then I'll just say I'm blind in a way that really puts them in their place. They won't understand the concept of day blindness nobody's ever heard of it. I say I see in black and White because people always assume colourblindness is just reds and greens. I do get monocromacy as the result on any colourblindness test (complete lack of colour vision) but I know I like purple if it's really strong so I think I can perceive a little colour if they're very strong and bright.

Pick the simplest most understandable symptom even if it's not the main one at all and just use that instead. Maybe agoraphobia or panic attacks but that they're getting better it will take time though. Something like that maybe?

Am I even making any sense at all? :-) lol I hope you can decipher what I mean anyway.

sheeps68

I often feel bad for my not working full time and claim DLA but somehow suspect a huge part of that is my wish that I could work full time etc. Currently off sick and about to go into my 4th week of sick leave oh I so want to be able to do things. Its times like this I really need my DLA as struggle with the simple things. Last night my meal was a cup a sup as simply couldnt do anything more. I only get low care but when things kick off I need higher levels however thats not consistent so I actually agree with my award level on a averaging out basis.

Also there is a certain TV programme that I simply cannot watch S&S with Dominic Littlewood as it just makes me want to hand my DLA back although I also know I qualify.Not to mention you cant see my difficulties for much of the time and I'm an expert at hiding things too.

Glad its not just me who feels this way with things though.

CRH71

Being the partner of one with disability, I have followed this thread with interest.

Yes, we DO feel a bit guilty about the DLA but at the end of the day it is money paid to the disabled person to help him/her lead an independent life (and, by default improve their quality of life - something that is all too lacking when faced with disability) and my working full-time puts far more per month back into "the system" than we obtain - who, therefore's gaining from this, and how can we be labelled as "scroungers"?

What really does shock me on this type of forum is the fact that DLA, and disability benefits in general, are the ones tarred with the "scrounger" brush (based on a few idiots blatantly abusing the system and the media over-hyping things and enticing hatred and discrimination) and it is almost socially-unacceptable to be in receipt of disability benefits, yet it is seemingly perfectly socially-acceptable to be in receipt of Child Benefit, or Working Tax Credits? Do these benefits not come from the same "pot"? To my eyes they do, so why is DLA "scrounging", yet WTC "acceptable"?

jakes-mum

Yes I too feel guilty about claiming benefits I get ESA and DLA as I have M.E. I look perfectly healthy, and I get looks from other people at the supermarket when I park in the disabled bay closest to the door and get my daughter out of the back. I feel people are judging me, why is that 32 yr old mother parking in disabled, what are mum and child not close enough for her? it may be in my head but I am very consious of people looking at me when i park up. I have a blue badge and if I dont park in the closest bay I cant actually get round the shop to get essentials without my mobility scooter (which makes me even more self concious). My local shop is also where I am still employed (been off sick for 2 years now but for some reason they dont eve sack people for inability to work). Every time I go in the shop im asked by a work colleague 'oh your looking well, when are you coming back?' and I hate that look of sceptisism when I reply 'im still too unwell to work'.

I do wish people could see me after a trip to get a pint of milk or to the bank to pay a bill, when I cannot get myself out of a chair they just dont understand what life is like when you have to make a choice between taking your daughter round the corner in the car to nursery or going to the shop for bread and milk for lunch as you are incapable of doing both.

I just had to redo my ESA form to renew my benefit and as my illness doesnt really fit with the form, i wrote a 4 page letter to go in that explained my life for the last 12 months. Even I was surprised by how limited my life is when I re read it. As I live it, i had never really absorbed how much illness controls my life.

Sorry went totally off topic there, but no OP you are definitely not alone

Richie-from-the-Boro

xXMessedUpXx wrote: »

I always feel guilty. Even though i've been assured by those around me (and even the dwp) that i am in need of them. I avoid seeing people as i'm so ashsmed of the fact i'm unwell and unable to work. Like someone else said the first thing people say to you when meeting you is "what do you do?". I hate that question. Truthfully I'm recovering from a serious mental illness and breakdown. But i feel i can't tell people that. There's still so much stigma attached to MI and people tend to run a mile if i say I'm mentally ill.
On the outside i look like a perfectly "normal" healthy 24 year old, but on the inside i'm broken and ill and people don't see that, they just make assumptions that you're fine. I'm too scared to leave the house atm as i think people will see me and think there's nothing wrong. Even though my cpn keeps telling me i need to get out and socialise with people otherwise i'll just end up more and more isolated.
If i could wave a magic wand and take this illness away and be able to work i would in a heartbeat.

You nor no one else should feel guilty, anyone who has managed to navigate through the system, satisfy the impossible hurdles and has been awarded help is entitled to it.

- if you worked all your life, paid all dues and were disabled at 55 and were awarded it you entitled to it
- if you've never worked a day in your life and were awarded it you are entitled to it - that's why the rest of us worked every day of our lives, to make sure we took care of you

And that is the way it should be. We are a rich enough nation to be able to take care of ourselves, and be able to lend a hand financial or otherwise to those who are not able to take care of themselves.

Trialia

Richie, that's a very kind attitude - thank you.

I'm one of the people who's never been able to work; I got progressively more ill through college and eventually had to drop out altogether, and I've never been well enough to go back for more than a short while. (I could only manage 3 hours a week from September to January, then collapsed with all my little stamina gone.) I have always known what I wanted to do with my working life - and then it got taken away from me, and I can't do it anymore. It drives me up the wall to have the general attitude towards people like me on top of not being able to do what I've always wanted to do.

vwelsh13

captain_mainwaring wrote: »

People only see what they want to. I can mow my garden in 20/30 minutes. Not bad eh? Then 2 days to recover! Do they see that? NO! I've felt guilty for years but I also have paid into the system. I'm getting too thick skinned now to care what they think! Don't feel guilty. Problem is, with this new Government we will all feel guilty and, the pinch, ouch!

Same with me...I can go for a ten minute walk then I'm in agony after, I have osteoarthritis in my neck...but people think oh yeah thats all?? I have got nerve damage from it and now have to do things left handed - I'm really right handed.

I feel bad claiming ESA but I have worked for years so I think its me geting my money back, my husband works too so his stoppages pay my benefit

preciousillusions

Yes, and it seems to be worse when you are claiming disability benefits for a non-visible illness. People can be so quick to judge when they have no understanding of the facts whatsoever.

serious_saver

I'm not disabled and I don't claim any benefits but it makes me really angry when people have a go at others over it. I would like to think that if anything every happened to me (likely with my family medical history) that people would treat me with respect.

I have a family member on DLA and people don't seem to understand that DLA is nothing to do with work. It's about allowing disabled people independence that others take for granted.

The thing that annoys me most is how people on incapacity benefit have often been described as lazy/work-shy. I know this is now ESA and it might be slightly different but to claim incapacity people had to have already paid sufficient national insurance contributions. THIS MEANS THEY WERE WORKING AND PAYING IN!!!!

OK rant over