Benefits

Find work anyway, and reclaim your independence.

"Benefits" are corrosive and best avoided if you can.

Being hooked on them never looks good in court... ;c) 

AND work can be FUN as well as pay your money, if you play your cards right.

I Sperg said:

Find work anyway, and reclaim your independence.

That and Fiona's post shows what a diverse group of people we are within sharing an autism diagnosis.Some of us have had good careers and then there are people like myself  who never had a paid job due to never having the help, and support, needed to make that a realistic outcome. Contrary to the decision to lump us all together, under an ASC/ASD  dx , we have little in common with each other outside of that shared diagnosis. If your autism is comparatively  mild enough that you can hold down a job, that's great. When people start using simplistic  terms like 'victim mindset', alarm bells start ringing in my mind. It's unhelpful and smacks of 'you just need to grow a backbone' rhetoric.

I Sperg said:

Find work anyway, and reclaim your independence.

That and Fiona's post shows what a diverse group of people we are within sharing an autism diagnosis.Some of us have had good careers and then there are people like myself  who never had a paid job due to never having the help, and support, needed to make that a realistic outcome. Contrary to the decision to lump us all together, under an ASC/ASD  dx , we have little in common with each other outside of that shared diagnosis. If your autism is comparatively  mild enough that you can hold down a job, that's great. When people start using simplistic  terms like 'victim mindset', alarm bells start ringing in my mind. It's unhelpful and smacks of 'you just need to grow a backbone' rhetoric.

I get where you are coming from.

With maximum assistance I think my longest ever employment has been 3 years. 

But there is a real value in ignorance. Before I knew I was Autistic there were things I could "just about do but was very bad at", now there are things I know I'll never be able to do satisfactorily, so why try? 

I'm never gonna win, so why play? 

I'm not playing word games here, these really are my thoughts some days, but I can't live like a subject begging for soccour from others.

To rise above my fate, to buck against the path that my Autism seeks to keep me on, to resist the "Framing" and categorisation and "boxing in" of others, does indeed seem to require that I "grow a backbone", "man up", "put some effort in", "resist the victim mindset" and generally try to find "character" where none previously existed.

For me it's just a hobby. I think if people try to force you to do that sort of thing against your will, that's bad and oppressive.

Getting back to social benefits, they do come at a cost, which varies depending on which ethno/social subset you happen to be, and obtaining and maintaining them does seem to become a full time occupation in and of itself. 

In my opinion I need some serious social beneft money given to me just to let me get on and do my thing, but in the opinion of many, many other people I need nothing at all. not even free good quality dentistry, so that what I get. MY g/f who is fantastically rich by my standards gives me 100 quid a month, but she'd really rather I didn't spend it on tobacco so I have to find extra money throuugh crime or hard work.

Lucrative crime where I don't have to hurt anyone directly by my actions, AKA government work is really thin on the ground for people like me, the last time I got any was during covid decding whather the ventilators and parts that your tax money paid for went to scrap, disposal or auction...     

So mostly I repair gardening equipment that I buy for thirty quid a unit, then thrash it for many years until it gets stolen, and THAT pays for my vices.  

I considered being an assassin, but after a bit of quick research I discovered that the average human life is so cheap now, that you have to do a LOT to make a decent crust.... And it's a very steep learning curve...

Still better than claming benefits from my perspective.. (Which I'm only offering because I have one)

As I have felt like a victim, on several things, throughout my life, I thought I'd been clear that I wasn't saying the original poster was a victim in any way, just that I'd found it unhelpful to think of myself as a victim. My flat was burgled: thinking of myself as a victim meant I was scared to sleep with the light off, and often only slept every 2 or 3 nights when I was so exhausted from vigilance; thinking of myself as a survivor allowed me to sleep at night once I'd taken the proper precautions. It wasn't 'simplistic', it was traumatic and complicated, took a lot of work over a few years, but because of the way I was brought up I was never expected to reach out for help, that had its own trauma too. I had to do it all myself because there was nobody I could ask for help. I think you projected your own simplicity to my words, and created your own alarm bells where none were intended.

This reframing has also helped a number of people I've supported in the past. I'm sorry if this doesn't work for you, but the forum is open to diverse opinions. I'm comfortable to disagree with you, as we all have valid opinions in a discussion.

I won't get into a competition here, but if I'm not 'showing' I'm autistic, then I am hiding all the struggles that get me through the day to my safe space at home to decompress. We don't know what each other is going through. We don't know what each other is dealing with under the surface. So we can't assume. I prefer to learn from each other than assume I know what someone else's life is like. I only really know what my own is like, because I live it every day. The more I hear how other people do things, the more I learn about diversity.

Since the original poster said they were signed off work, to me this implies they had been working at something to be signed off from it, so there may be some desire to get back to doing something similar. If I have misread the post, then I apologise for my responding to a misunderstood comment.