It turns out that love doesn’t pay the bills. I mentioned in an earlier post that I don’t get much of a student loan. Because my parents aren’t in a position to help us out financially, Paul works to supplement our income. I have always felt frustrated and guilty that I am not able to pay my half of the bills. I already feel bad that he has to care for me, having to work to contribute more to our household income than I do on top of that, just feels like so much to ask from a 20 year old.

We were so blessed that Paul was able to get a job with the university, which pays well and gives the flexible hours he needs to be able to care for me and study. Unfortunately, it means that he isn’t able to work from now until the beginning of October, when lectures begin again. With us getting married in September, dipping into our savings to get through the summer isn’t an option. We’ll be fine, God has always provided for us, and we still have a couple of ideas in the pipeline, so I’m not worried, but I am frustrated. I hate that no matter how hard I try, I can’t find any way to make money. I am looking at anything and everything I could cut out so I can reduce my spending, there isn’t much anyway, but I can’t find any way to actually bring money in. When I was younger, I tried to hold down a couple of jobs but the intensity of working even 4-5 hour shifts made my M.E. so bad that I wasn’t well enough to go to school. I just wish so much that I could go out and get a job and then we’d be fine financially, and maybe even save for a honeymoon. I know I shouldn’t think like this, there is no point living in the world of what ifs. Not least, because in some ways it contradicts what I wrote about yesterday.

I think it’s ok to feel frustrated though. It is something I have come up against time and again, and I know this frustration at not being able to work is shared by many people with illnesses like me. Most people suffering from chronic illnesses are dependent on benefits, but they don’t want to be. Chronic illnesses are often invisible, the sufferer looks completely fine, healthy even. I barely ever actually look ill. At the moment especially, spoonies (people with chronic illnesses) are being branded as lazy scroungers, taking money off hard-working tax payers. In all the media stories and political propaganda, it is often failed to mention that many of these people already worked for years and years, contributed their taxes and national insurance. Don’t people pay national insurance so that when they get sick the state helps them? Only now to be persecuted for that.

My dad worked from the age of 16, the week after he finished school, until he became too sick to work because of M.E. and crumbling discs in his back. He got back to work as soon as he could but it took him years, and for those years we lived in poverty. Not because my parents spent money on alcohol and cigarettes or because we ate out loads, like some people believe. I don’t know how these mythical characters get £30,000 on benefits, but they sure aren’t common. You never see stories like my dad’s mentioned though.

Let me drill down to my point, a lot of people who are not able to work, are depressed because of that. I am trying very hard to stay strong against that, but it is not made easier by people treating you like a layabout, who if they just tried to work might realise they’re fine. It is so hurtful when people resent the help sick people are given from the state because they think the condition is imaginary. The typical line is, “I saw them at so-and-so and they looked fine.” You want so badly to prove them wrong, that you are hardworking and want to get better, but how can you? This frustration is so endemic that I know of lots of people struggling through training when they are clearly not well enough to work, or taking huge amounts of painkillers to get through a day, or, like I’ve already mentioned, thousands taking anti-depressants to deal with it.

Right now, my family and I are trying really hard to think of something I can manage to do that someone will pay me for, not just because I need money now, but because the prospect of being dependent on the state when I graduate is terrifying. It is no fun and games being on sick benefits, terrified that at any moment they’ll be taken away, or worse that you are falsely accused of fraud by some person who thinks you’re faking. And, that’s assuming you even get the DWP to believe that you are too sick to work. The frustration has many reasons and levels and it just won’t go away…

Love Katie x

There is a related post about the effect of benefit cuts on the disabled on my other blog. You can find it here.

Posted by chronickatie in Fibromyalgia, M.E./CFS Tags: benefit fraud, benefits, CFS, chronic condition, chronic illness, depression, depression from sickness, DLA, DWP, ESA, fibromyalgia, folk devil, frustration, government, job, M.E., propaganda, scrounger, sick benefits, state benefits, the state, unemployment, unemployment benefits