I am worried about my son's ongoing ESA claim as, for around 2 years now, he has refused to engage with services which means, of course, that there are no appointments, treatments or medications we can refer to, nor any clinic or professional opinion we can include. In short, no corroborative evidence. It is only a matter of time before the dreaded ESA questionnaire lands, in order to update the information that was very well supported for the original claim (crisis team, early intervention in psychosis team, GP and CPN).
Our son (23) is extremely withdrawn, mucky, possibly depressed and very hard to engage in any conversation. In spite of having been discharged from the early intervention team because they diagnosed him with Asperger's and said they could find no evidence of mental illness, our son insists that he doesn't have autism and wants to be left to sort out his own problems in his own way. This he does by avoiding everyone and he seems to find it almost painful to talk to us. Or indeed anyone. He has no friends or interests outside the home and, although we try to be supportive in a person-centred way, it's hard to know what we can do to help.
How might we encourage engagement? And how on earth can we protect his interests financially?
