Published on 12, July, 2020
For a long time I´ve tried to figure out why I got my diagnosis (PDD-NOS) and I´m going to get a second opinion. But one thing that could be seen as a form of "disability" is perhaps that I´m been unemployed for a long time, I´m 37 years old, and I I´ve worked only for shorter periods of time. I´ve studied at university and completed two exams. For two years I´ve been diagnosed with depression and anxiety and I´m not sure what´s what and what has contributed moslyt to my unemployment. I have only positive job credentials but I didn´t find the jobs to be interesting or stimulating enough. Now, after several years of unemployment this becomes a problem and I risk having to engage in unemployment activities that´ll only make me feel worse.
I don´t know if I would manage to have a full time job for a longer period of time, like several years or if my diagnosis is the reason why I don´t feel any job is interesting enough. I easily feel "trapped" and bored by office work even if I don´t mean I would want to work on a farm or similar.
I want to ask others if longer periods of unemployment are significant for people on the spectrum?
from not being diagnosed with Autism as a child and being sent to metal hospitals and units I ended up with social anxiety , I did try working when I was a teen on YTS but I ended up having panic attacks and running home. I am now 45 and have not worked since a teen, I have volunteered and was working with a ferret recue from my home, but I get so stressed at just the thought of going shopping that I cant even consider getting a job, just the thought of it sends fear in to me. I was a single mum for 17 years and I was good at that so I feel I have done my bit as my daughter is a very caring loving person who works in a care home. But I have spent my life being told I am lazy and benefit scrounger to the point I just wanted to kill my self , I only just got my Autism diagnosis even though I self diagnosed myself when I was 26 , I would have been happy to just live with my self diagnose but when PIP came in they put me though hell as it was not in my doctors records so they did not believe me. I went though so much getting my pip that it has knocked me back, I was doing so much better and going out more but having to sit in court to prove I was not lying has made me not want to leave the house at all. I know some people with Autism can work but others can't and I feel its unfair to look down on those who cant, we are not lazy we are busy just making it through the day. I would like the government to be more understanding that we are all different ,
Society also needs to change its value system. They value people on what job they do, what car they drive, what house they have etc but some of us will never achieve these values for various different reasons, and as such, we are seen as less than. But we know we’re not and that’s the main thing, even though it seems worthless at times because so many people follow the ‘norm’. But the truth is, we’re just as valid and equal as anybody else and we must try to always remember that.
Very well said, BlueRay. Society likes to find soft targets to vilify and abuse, and people on benefits get the worst of it. I was several years on ESA after my breakdown - yet to all intents and purposes, as other people saw it, I was perfectly healthy and normal. Even though I did voluntary work during this time, I was made - by some - to feel like a malingerer. Values are all skewed. People at the top end - the ones who caused all the grief in the first place - get away with big bonuses, tax avoidance, expenses fiddling, etc. But no... society, aided and abetted by the tabloids and popular TV programmes, stick the knives into those who struggle to simply make it through a day without either running out of money, being evicted, or worse. Jacqui - I have a dear friend whom I met when I was using a substance misuse facility. She's beautiful, intelligent, articulate and well-educated. But, now in her early 40s, she's never been able to work. She volunteers at a local hospice, which is as much as she can manage. What people don't understand is that she would probably give anything not to be the way she is; to be able to live a 'normal' life, have a home, have children - all the things that her sister has. No... they see this person I've described and think 'Why aren't you working?' No wonder sick people become sicker, with so much against them.
Take heart, though. We understand you. Try not to take any notice of the idiots - for that's what they are.
thanks Martian