Claiming DLA and Esa

colpol1

Parva wrote: »

As per GlasweJen's post above, one does not just walk into a doctors surgery and be diagnosed with severe depression without any sort of medically recorded history behind them. Why did you not ask for or your doctor not give you a sicknote? Remember, you want to claim ESA and a sicknote would have enabled you to do so, at the very least up until the 3 months before you're summoned for a work test.

Also I am sure I have said this, I have medical history behind me! When I was 13-15 I went to them and they spent time with me and then sent me to relaxation therapy and to see a phyciatrist ( ugh, sorry my spelling is terrible. ) I then went to a school for people who have issues like me, nearly everyone there suffered from anxiety or depression..and I have been to the doctors twice in the last 3 years, she just didn't do anything for me and wouldn't listen and kept sending me back for blood test...and I booked this appointment with a new doctor hoping he would listen and he did, so its not as if I have nothing there and I have just suddenly popped up with this depression.

50Twuncle

It sounds as if you need support from a professional group or charity ?
I suggest that to start with - a visit to your GP is necessary - followed by your local Citizens Advice Bureau - the CAB should be able to point you towards the help/support that you are looking for......

JillyJolly_2

I said at the start you need professional help, the GP won't be an answer to all your problems, you need support workers who are professionals in dealing with anxiety / depression, often you will get a psychiatrist meeting and they will diagnoze what you suffer with and then the support workers will talk about what meds to take, you should not just take anti depressants without researching all the side effects.

Then you need professionals such as Framework to help you with your benefits, with just a GP alone you don't stand much chance of getting any benefits especially if you don't know how to fill all the forms in correctly and have no medical evidence to show your illness.

From experience don't rely on your GP, I've had a very bad experience from them to the point where they made me suicidal, thankfully I got help from professionals in this area who sent letters to the GP's about my problems and thus I get treated correctly now. Some doctors are fine but in my experience I've seen 8 different doctors and only 2 was actually any help at all.

mazza111

I often find that counselling is the best form of therapy in a lot of cases. Hopefully there isn't a long list in the OP case. Might be a lot of tears and snot but it certainly can help.

Although there are good and bad everywhere. I had one psychiatrist, an Asian chap, who told me I must go home and love my husband very much, bearing in mind it was my x husband who caused most of my problems. The answer is there, but it takes you to go and find it Colpol. If at first you don't succeed...

You will get there.

Good luck with it all.

Oldernotwiser

JillyJolly wrote: »

I said at the start you need professional help, the GP won't be an answer to all your problems, you need support workers who are professionals in dealing with anxiety / depression, often you will get a psychiatrist meeting and they will diagnoze what you suffer with and then the support workers will talk about what meds to take, you should not just take anti depressants without researching all the side effects.

There are side effects to every drug, why start a course of medication looking for trouble? At the very least, don't avoid taking them because of what you read!

I think you're making things unnecessarily complicated for someone in the OP's situation. For large numbers of people, ADs can be very effective on their own, particularly if they lead the person into a more normal life both socially and in employment.

All the things you mention are useful for people with long standing problems where medication hasn't helped but for the majority of people with short term problems largely caused by temporary circumstances, ADs have a good chance of being effective.

Look to bring in the big guns if necessary but not at first, otherwise it's possible to make a full time career of being ill!

JillyJolly_2

Then she's unlikely to get any benefits, especially because most are being rejected and if not done right / or without proper evidence / know how or help you will be rejected.

If you have a problem you need to tackle it head on with all the help possible to insure a faster recover, waiting for months or years for it to drag on with only seeing a GP and not getting professional help does not help people to get better, in fact it can make them allot worse as the illness going on for a longer period of time without any proper help or support.

I researched anti depresents before going on them, and some of the side effects are nasty, reading peoples reports I would never touch most of them, there was two kinds I was willing to take, one messed up my liver (as it being one of the side effects,) but the other (Mirtazapine) is working out to be fine.

Oldernotwiser

JillyJolly wrote: »

Then she's unlikely to get any benefits, especially because most are being rejected and if not done right / or without proper evidence / know how or help you will be rejected.

If you have a problem you need to tackle it head on with all the help possible to insure a faster recover, waiting for months or years for it to drag on with only seeing a GP and not getting professional help does not help people to get better, in fact it can make them allot worse as the illness going on for a longer period of time without any proper help or support.

I researched anti depresents before going on them, and some of the side effects are nasty, reading peoples reports I would never touch most of them, there was two kinds I was willing to take, one messed up my liver (as it being one of the side effects,) but the other (Mirtazapine) is working out to be fine.

Seeing a GP is getting professional help!

As the OP hasn't sought help in all this time, I think it's a bit much to talk about things "dragging on" by this route. I also read up on medications but, as I said before, everything has side effects. I wasn't mad about a couple of ADs I've been on but the benefits outweighed the side effects so I took them until I was well enough to come off them or change to something else.

One of the medications my husband takes (not for MH issues) is slowly killing him but he'd die a damn site sooner without it!

bestpud

JillyJolly wrote: »

Then she's unlikely to get any benefits, especially because most are being rejected and if not done right / or without proper evidence / know how or help you will be rejected.

If you have a problem you need to tackle it head on with all the help possible to insure a faster recover, waiting for months or years for it to drag on with only seeing a GP and not getting professional help does not help people to get better, in fact it can make them allot worse as the illness going on for a longer period of time without any proper help or support.

I researched anti depresents before going on them, and some of the side effects are nasty, reading peoples reports I would never touch most of them, there was two kinds I was willing to take, one messed up my liver (as it being one of the side effects,) but the other (Mirtazapine) is working out to be fine.

Thing is with google, you will find what you want to see.

I agree there is side effects but have you read the instruction leaflet on other meds? It seems every medication going can cause you to be ill!

Sometimes you just have to weigh up the symptoms against the potential side effects.

Parva

Actually, the OP has sought professional help, allegedly. She was given a box of tablets and told to return in a fortnight if memory serves.

All of this detracts from the fact that the OP started this thread to ask about claiming ESA and dare I even say DLA! Yet the very person that started this debate appears happy with a box of Smarties given to her by the GP and conveniently forgets that all of this started because she wanted to get onto the welfare gravy train.

Either her JSA claiming boyfriend is a genius at living a freegan lifestyle or the OP is being supported elsewhere. Nobody can tell me that someone can manage to get out of the house once every 2 weeks to sign on for what, six months (12 months for 25+, I don't know the 18+ limit) and not be able to attend the Work Programme because they suddenly got ill.

Even if it was the lower 6 month limit, that is 12 times that the OP had to go to the Jobcentre. Is the Jobcentre right next door? Looky here, Work Programme! Ohhhh, I've come over all dizzy, I suffer from (name your tune here.... _________).

I don't care if I sound harsh, I'm a Yorkshireman afterall and it's how we are. That said, if the OP made the effort to pose the question about ESA and DLA then why didn't they ask the doctor for this magic sicknote that would have put them on ESA rather than claiming nothing at all? And yes Calpol (or whatever your name is) I've taken on board the fact that you were prescribed anti-depressants and whatnot, been there, done it and got the sicknote!

ab.da54

GlasweJen wrote: »

You've not even seen a doctor yet and you're writing yourself off! You don't know how lucky you are, I'd kill to be in your shoes. How wonderful to be able to walk to the job centre, or catch a bus into town, or to go somewhere without my sister or a nurse. I'd give anything to be able to live with my boyfriend, to be able to choose my career instead of tailoring it to fit my ever increasing list of disabilities.

I cry every day, it's survivors guilt. I find it really difficult knowing someone died the day I got that call, and knowing there was someone else at the hospital hoping and praying for the heart that I got. I wonder if that person lived or died. I wonder what I did to deserve it out of the thousands of names on the list. I'll never know and I'll never be able to say thank you.

You can't compare clinical depression with a touch of life getting at you sometimes. You also can't claim benefits for that.

Whilst your health problems are many, what is it with the 'my health is worse than your health' attitude that seems to be lurking on here?

As you don't know the OP, how can you confidently state they have a touch of life getting at you sometimes?