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Please Help Me... (Housing - benefits)

Luke

My anxiety is skyrocketing at the moment due to housing issues.

I have lived with my mum and step-dad for the past 8 years or so.

My mother is a Methodist Minister, and housing is provided integrally to this job.

She has been assigned a new manse along with a change of location.

The new location will not be appropriate for me to live in - it is too small.

I also do not want to move away from this area, which has been a base for nearly 20 years.

For a long time a local organisation have been promising that autism appropriate accommodation would be available imminently.

They knew that the start of August 2014 was my deadline for moving out, ever since my initial application, which must be at least 18 months ago now, maybe 2 years or even longer.

Only now, at short notice have they confirmed that they in fact do not have any autism appropriate vacancies available, nor will they at any time in the forseeable future.

Up until this point they had always presented a rosey outlook on the availability of their services.

As such I am suddenly left in the lurch, struggling to source a local autism appropriate property, together with dealing with all benefits related issues and so-on, then move out, all within a time frame of weeks.

It is going ok I guess, I have a social worker assigned to me, and I also have the involvement of a local autism specialist charity.

My big problem at the moment revolves around housing benefits.

A disability advice organisation has told me that I can get housing benefits up to the amount of the average price of the average comparable property rate.

When I pheond the council helpline the council say I can only get the shared rate - around £58 per week.

I've only found one property that I could afford with that, and it seemed entirely inappropriate - I am quite scared by the idea of living there at the moment.

I have viewed at least 2 properties at about £80-90 mark that seem ok - there seem to be quite a lot locally, it is just the money that is the issue.

I am on ESA, I also claim low rate moblity DLA, but I am studying and still paying for that.

I think I might be able to top up my rent about £10 a week but I would struggle with much more than that.

I thought my social worker might help with all of this but at the moment he seems to have left it to me - with the help of my charity support workers.

I discovered Discretionary Housing Payments with an application form on the council website.

Do you think that this is what the Disability Advice organisation was referring to?

Please - what are other peoples experiences and knowledge around this area?

I would greatly appreciate it if somebody could share. The thought of being homeless, or in horrible housing is terrifying me - it is so frustrating that nobody seems to be able to help me or give me a straight answer.

I am just going round in circles and I can feel it making me quite ill.

Parents

  • NAS18906 said:

    Outraged, I think I remember you making some comments on a previous thread about how you decided to break out of your social anxiety hermit phase by deciding that it was about time to come out and play with the real world. Do you remember that or did I get it wrong? Have you any advice for Luke on dealing with his anxieties that are making his life hard to bear?

    I dont want to treat the matter as if Luke needs to manage his condition better; his expressed anxieties are perfectly appropriate to his situation as the housing in the price range quoted is execrable with structual, electrical and plumming failures common and rampant anti-social behaviour. Used needles are present. Persons with ASVs are quickly targeted for bullying. It really isn't appropriate accomodation for pidgeons and rats let alone Luke. He needs to insist on housing from a "social housing provider" such as the council or a housing association, they do have specialist flats for persons with disabilities but they are hard to get. 

    Further, while I have gone to efforts to avoid hermitage, my degree of sucess has been to now operate at a similar level to Luke (I'll walk some places, but won't take a bus) so I'm not really in a position to urge greater effort. I will however say that it is helpful to have a standing agreement with a local taxi service that the driver be briefed not to engage you in conversation/banter, though on ESA it is likely to be difficult to pay taxi fare everywhere. 

    I'm also not sure that the methods I use to resist hermitage and avoid anxiety would be appropriate for someone living in a clergyman's household as they are directly oposed to the "turn the other cheek"/"be the better man"/"rise above the conflict" philosophy. But if your interested I took private martial arts instruction, chose to assume behvours like staring/snigering/whispering were malicious rather than ignorant, and go about in public prepared to refute insult and where necessary defend my person. I don't know by what telepethy NTs know who to bully but when you are not prepared to take abuse they studiously ignore you...or become violent hense the martial arts training. As I say, inappropriate while he lives with his family but probably necessary if he ends up in slumlord controled housing.    

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  • NAS18906 said:

    Outraged, I think I remember you making some comments on a previous thread about how you decided to break out of your social anxiety hermit phase by deciding that it was about time to come out and play with the real world. Do you remember that or did I get it wrong? Have you any advice for Luke on dealing with his anxieties that are making his life hard to bear?

    I dont want to treat the matter as if Luke needs to manage his condition better; his expressed anxieties are perfectly appropriate to his situation as the housing in the price range quoted is execrable with structual, electrical and plumming failures common and rampant anti-social behaviour. Used needles are present. Persons with ASVs are quickly targeted for bullying. It really isn't appropriate accomodation for pidgeons and rats let alone Luke. He needs to insist on housing from a "social housing provider" such as the council or a housing association, they do have specialist flats for persons with disabilities but they are hard to get. 

    Further, while I have gone to efforts to avoid hermitage, my degree of sucess has been to now operate at a similar level to Luke (I'll walk some places, but won't take a bus) so I'm not really in a position to urge greater effort. I will however say that it is helpful to have a standing agreement with a local taxi service that the driver be briefed not to engage you in conversation/banter, though on ESA it is likely to be difficult to pay taxi fare everywhere. 

    I'm also not sure that the methods I use to resist hermitage and avoid anxiety would be appropriate for someone living in a clergyman's household as they are directly oposed to the "turn the other cheek"/"be the better man"/"rise above the conflict" philosophy. But if your interested I took private martial arts instruction, chose to assume behvours like staring/snigering/whispering were malicious rather than ignorant, and go about in public prepared to refute insult and where necessary defend my person. I don't know by what telepethy NTs know who to bully but when you are not prepared to take abuse they studiously ignore you...or become violent hense the martial arts training. As I say, inappropriate while he lives with his family but probably necessary if he ends up in slumlord controled housing.    

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