PIP and ESA for aspies

littlerat

Going to pop in here.

Definitely apply for ESA and PIP. Not sure of PIP criteria, but you can get ESA for mental health issues (I know aspergers isn't a mental health problem itself but its symptoms are similar). On DLA at least, many people do get lower mobility and/or care - get your social worker to fill it out for you or help you, it's not always easy to know what help you're needing. Part of my mobility is because I cannot go to unfamiliar or crowded places due to mental health issues, ability to go to unfamiliar places is one of the questions on DLA. PIP is differently worded and somewhat changes but I assume there will be mental health descriptors.. This is the important part though as your diagnosis, while mentionable is not the actual issue, it's the symptoms you have that will decide whether you're entitled.

Once you're on some sort of disability benefit you're more likely to be classed as in need of the extra for non-shared accommodation, as again it may come down to the stress social situations place on you.


I will add for others here, medical problems that cause severe social anxiety are not the same as not liking being with other people. I hope you don't mind me saying OP, but somebody with aspergers may not be the best person to articulate that as it feels like an avid dislike, but I'm going to guess there's panic attacks and severe anxiety involved rather than just thinking "Hmm, people, don't really want to be here.". He's more likely to be able to one day work (if from home, or in a solitary job) if the stress can be alleviated and for somebody with social issues, that's not going to happen in shared accommodation.



OP, I'd also add that you do consider a psychiatrist or other mental health professional. They won't make you magically able to enjoy social situations, but they may be able to help with techniques for when you have no choice - I'm not suggesting this so you can work even, although obviously you may one day find a job that is isolated and suit you, but rather just make day to day life a little less stressful for you.

DailyLife

littlerat wrote: »

Going to pop in here.

Definitely apply for ESA and PIP. Not sure of PIP criteria, but you can get ESA for mental health issues (I know aspergers isn't a mental health problem itself but its symptoms are similar). On DLA at least, many people do get lower mobility and/or care - get your social worker to fill it out for you or help you, it's not always easy to know what help you're needing. Part of my mobility is because I cannot go to unfamiliar or crowded places due to mental health issues, ability to go to unfamiliar places is one of the questions on DLA. PIP is differently worded and somewhat changes but I assume there will be mental health descriptors.. This is the important part though as your diagnosis, while mentionable is not the actual issue, it's the symptoms you have that will decide whether you're entitled.

Once you're on some sort of disability benefit you're more likely to be classed as in need of the extra for non-shared accommodation, as again it may come down to the stress social situations place on you.


I will add for others here, medical problems that cause severe social anxiety are not the same as not liking being with other people. I hope you don't mind me saying OP, but somebody with aspergers may not be the best person to articulate that as it feels like an avid dislike, but I'm going to guess there's panic attacks and severe anxiety involved rather than just thinking "Hmm, people, don't really want to be here.". He's more likely to be able to one day work (if from home, or in a solitary job) if the stress can be alleviated and for somebody with social issues, that's not going to happen in shared accommodation.



OP, I'd also add that you do consider a psychiatrist or other mental health professional. They won't make you magically able to enjoy social situations, but they may be able to help with techniques for when you have no choice - I'm not suggesting this so you can work even, although obviously you may one day find a job that is isolated and suit you, but rather just make day to day life a little less stressful for you.

Thanks for your detailed post. I find social situations terribly difficult to deal with and you're right it isn't a choice of "I want to live by myself because I'd prefer it"... living with others makes my life extremely tough. I suffer from social encounters so badly that I won't even go down to the kitchen to make something to eat while I know there is someone in there, I will wait for the kitchen to be empty then sneak in and make something quickly.

The thought of them making conversation with me makes me very anxious indeed. For those people wondering they're not housemates like at uni or something, we're all random people. I am so scared to go to my doctors and actually start a course of some sort of medication because I hate to be labelled and once I'm officially diagnosed as being depressed and suffering from anxiety disorder I just feel like I'm being hammered with the "broken" stamp.

I wished people understood... Just as you couldn't bare living in isolation, you'd go mental... I can't bare to be around people, it is slowly driving me crazy and I can feel myself getting worse and worse. Today I could't even go into the shop to buy a drink because I just had a mini panic attack of being asked "How is your day" or something.

bedpotato_2

DailyLife wrote: »

Thanks for your detailed post. I find social situations terribly difficult to deal with and you're right it isn't a choice of "I want to live by myself because I'd prefer it"... living with others makes my life extremely tough. I suffer from social encounters so badly that I won't even go down to the kitchen to make something to eat while I know there is someone in there, I will wait for the kitchen to be empty then sneak in and make something quickly.

The thought of them making conversation with me makes me very anxious indeed. For those people wondering they're not housemates like at uni or something, we're all random people. I am so scared to go to my doctors and actually start a course of some sort of medication because I hate to be labelled and once I'm officially diagnosed as being depressed and suffering from anxiety disorder I just feel like I'm being hammered with the "broken" stamp.

I wished people understood... Just as you couldn't bare living in isolation, you'd go mental... I can't bare to be around people, it is slowly driving me crazy and I can feel myself getting worse and worse. Today I could't even go into the shop to buy a drink because I just had a mini panic attack of being asked "How is your day" or something.

Dear DailyLife, I completely understand. I have Asperger's too, and I am exactly the same. When I was in flat shares I was a nervous wreck. Just like you, I would wait until everybody else had gone to bed before sneaking out to use the bathroom or toilet, and would live in a permanent state of extreme anxiety and terror. Thankfully I am now in a small house of my own. I managed to be awarded ESA and have put in a claim for PIP as well. You should do the same.

People who do not have Asperger's do not understand. The ignorant comments on this thread saying things like "well, none of us like sharing, do we" are extremely ignorant. I hate it when non-autistic people listen to our descriptions of what it's like to be autistic and then try to claim that ordinary people go through the same things. They don't.

OK I am about to do a rant here. :mad:

Saying to an autistic person "I know how you feel; I don't like sharing either" is like saying to a blind person "I know how you feel; I can't see well without my glasses on either" or saying to a deaf person "I know how you feel; I can't hear people very well if I've got wax in my ear" or saying to a double amputee "I know how you feel; sometimes my legs get tired when I try to run for the bus."

Would you say those things to a blind or deaf person, or a person with no legs? No. Of course not. It would be rude, upsetting, and completely untrue. Unless you are blind or deaf or have no legs, you do not know what it feels like to be blind or deaf or to have no legs, do you? Well, guess what? The same principle applies to autism. Autism is a disability, too - and unless you are autistic, you do not know what it feels like to have it.

In case people didn't know, autism is not a mental illness. It is better described as a physical disability inside the brain. It is a neurological developmental disorder, meaning that certain brain cells did not develop in the way that normal brain cells do. That means our autistic brains can't handle too much conversation or social interaction, because they are already too busy struggling with trying to process all the other things we are already thinking about.

Unless you are autistic, and have a brain that developed abnormally, you do not know what it feels like to be autistic, any more than you know what it feels like to be blind or deaf or to have no legs. So please, non-autistic people: STOP with all these attempts to say that the issues faced by autistic people are the same as the issues faced by anybody else. It's completely untrue, and also disgustingly insulting and just plain rude.

If you are not autistic, you do not (and never will) know what it is like to experience neurological sensory overload caused by forced social interaction. End of story.

Extreme social phobia caused by the sensory overload that comes with autism is NOT THE SAME THING as picky non-autistic people "not liking to share." Some normal people perhaps don't like sharing their houses or belongings because they are possessive with them and want to greedily keep them all to themselves. Perhaps they would rather live in pampered luxury and have a whole house to themselves as opposed to bunking down and living alongside others in more basic conditions. Or perhaps they are neat control freaks, who want to keep all their posessions neatly arranged just so, and don't want any messy people being in the house and messing things up. Those are their reasons for not wanting to share, so they are assuming that the OP's motives for not wanting to share are the same.

Well, those are NOT the same reasons that autistic people need houses of their own. We need houses of our own because we have a developmental disorder in our brains. That means that when our brains were developing, some of the brain cells didn't grow properly. FYI we are lacking parts of our brains that you normal people have. That means too much social interaction is too much for our brains to handle. Our brains cannot handle too much input at once. Too much talking; too much noise; too much scent; too much of anything will make too much sensory input for our brains to process, and drive us to despair.

Non-autistic people, imagine how you would feel if you were forced to live in a house where there was too much sensory input for your normal brains. For example, a house where there was an incredibly strong overpowering smell all the time that made you gag, and you had to walk around retching and covering your mouth all the time. Say, the smell of rotten eggs. You couldn't handle that, could you? You couldn't handle being forced to live in a house where there was a permanent disgusting smell of rotten eggs, and you were not allowed to wear a gas mask. Or a house where the fire alarm was going off 24/7, and making your head hurt. Or a house where there were very bright dazzling lights everywhere, as bright as the sun, and you wished you could wear sunglasses, all the time, but none were available, so all you could do was choose to either close your eyes and bump into things, or open them and have them hurt and dazzled by the sun. Well, that is how the OP feels due to having to live with other human beings.

The OP's BRAIN is overwhelmed. Living with other humans causes the OP physical neurological pain in his brain due to the overwhelming sensory input caused by social interaction.

Autism is a NEUROLOGICAL CONDITION in the brain. By saying he doesn't want to live with other people he is not being fussy or picky, or demanding special treatment. He is just wanting to have the basic thing that, in an ideal world, all autistic people would have: a house of his own.

OP, I hope it works out and I strongly advise you to apply for ESA and PIP. Like you, I gloomily assumed I would not be eligible for them, but you won't know until you try. Here is a helpful link explaining to people with Asperger's how they should try to fill in their questionnaire. If you want you can PM me and I will try to help based on my own experiences.

http://treatid.blogspot.co.uk/

Sorry if I called you the wrong gender. I don't know if you are a she or a he.

jacques_chirac wrote:

Shutting yourself off from the world is not a long term solution to your problems.

This is well-meant but ignorant and stupid advice. It would be excellent and true advice to give to a non-autistic person, but it is entirely untrue when spoken to an autistic person.

Go and educate yourself about autism before trying to give advice to autistic people.

As an autistic person, I have a full awareness that neurotypicals (meaning non-autistic people) are not like me. I am aware that non-autistic people crave, want, and need social interaction. Therefore, I would never try to advise, pressurise or force them into the kind of solitude that an autistic person craves. If a non-autistic person posted here on these message boards saying they were lonely or suicidal or whatever, I would advise them as you did above, and tell them they should get out the house and make some friends.

However, it seems it doesn't work the other way around. Autistic people understand, respect and acknowledge the needs of neurotypicals, but this courtesy is not returned. The vast majority of neurotypicals have no awareness that autistic people crave, want, and need complete solitude to be healthy.

Therefore, whenever an autistic person seeks advice, well-meaning ignorant people always try to advise, pressurise or force them into precisely the kind of social interaction that drives autistic people to despair, meltdown, nervous breakdown, and suicide.

OP, I learned years ago to stop trying to live up to all the irrelevant advice the neurotypicals were giving me. They were talking to me as though I were a neurotypical also, and saying: "you should get out more. Go here. Go there. Do this. Do that. Go to this club. Meet these people. Make friends with this person. Attend this coffee morning. Go to this theatre performance. Then you will feel better."

Because I am not neurotypical, their advice had the opposite effect. Obediently doing all of those things in an attempt to make myself feel "better" only led to complete and utter nervous breakdown. I have now cut myself off from the world completely and stay happily at home, in a lifestyle that is completely normal and healthy for an autist.

If you are autistic, do not let them make you feel guilty, anxious, or worried for wanting or needing to spend lots of time alone. Far from telling you to get out more, here is the advice I would give you, because I know you are autistic like me:

"You should stay at home more. Lie down. Rest. Do nothing. Just lie on your bed and relax and let yourself do nothing. Give your poor brain a rest. Talk to yourself. Sing. Skip. Jump up and down and clap your hands and be happy. Learn things on the Internet. Do maths and physics for no other reason but the fact that it makes you happy to do maths and physics. Accept that your brain does not want to go to sleep at normal times. Sometimes you will be asleep during the day and awake all night. This does not happen because you are lazy. It happens because your brain is very special and busy. Once you learn to stop fighting the insomnia, you will accept that perhaps your brain will never conform to an NT sleep pattern, because you are not NT. Since you are autistic, it is perfectly OK for your brain to follow a random autistic sleep pattern instead. (I mean that it is "OK" in the sense of it not being your fault. It is not OK in terms of the effects on your health. I have insomnia too, and most days I feel like crap. The last thing you need when you're feeling like crap is to have false guilt and shame heaped upon you due to always having been told that you are weak or lazy for not being able to go to sleep. If your brain can't or won't go to sleep, it's not your fault). Once you can learn to stop feeling guilty and worried for not living up to the standards of an NT lifestyle (standards that never applied to you in the first place), then a lot of the false guilt and anxiety that has been heaped upon you will fall away, and you will start to feel better."

This kind of lifestyle would be entirely wrong and unhealthy for a neurotypical, and would lead to extreme depression and loneliness and suicide, but for an autistic person, the reverse is true. Living their lifestyle would lead us to despair, and living our lifestyle would lead them to despair. We need solitude to be happy and for our brains to function; they need other people.

1plus1equal3

Wow you have summed up everything my son has explained to me over the years , about living with aspergers. Hes 33 years old now, and im still learning from him. But one thing i do know, i may be sad that he dosnt socialize, but hes not. He is happy, so i am too.We had endless problems with him while he was growing up, and though i couldnt put my finger on the specific problem, he was finally diagnosed at the age of 18. With that diagnoses i realised i had to stop trying to make him "normal" ( what ever normal is) Hes my son , who lives with aspergers, and i hate the term aspie, I strongly believe that this word will one day be used in a detrimental way , as was the term !!!!!!.(no offence meant).and others which i wont use, as they no longer have the same meaning as originally meant for.