Depends how homeless you mean exactly. Sleeping on the street? No, not yet. But moving from place to place, couchsurfing, hostels, and having to speak to an advisor about potentially accessing a homeless shelter, yes. IME there is actually very little help out there. I’m not surprised there are so many people living in tents now. What country are you in? If you’re homeless in the UK the council are supposed to find you somewhere, but they often don’t. I saw a woman post on reddit the other day about how she presented as homeless to the local council and they gave her three terrible options, one of which was sleeping on the street. More and more poor and disabled people are just being left to fend for themselves.

Thank you!

Thank you so much, I really appreciate it!

thanks for the bump

Thanks for the bump!

Thanks for the bump!

Thanks, I do really appreciate the effort.

Thanks for trying anyway. I know it’s a nuisance, with the gift cards.

Thank you so much, I do truly appreciate it.

This explains a lot about the horrible way Christians treated me when I asked them for help finding food banks/accessing food in general. They told me to “man up and sort your own problems out,” and said I shouldn’t even be getting disability benefits anyway because “that’s socialism,” and refused to help me in any way. I think you’re right and they viewed me as undeserving for being weak.

I feel it’s like the people who jumped from the building during 9/11. You are of course scared to jump but eventually what’s behind you, pushing you to jump is even scarier.

If I win my benefit claim then they’ll check the past 6 months of my accounts. They estimate my appeal will be heard in January. If I win I’ll probably start receiving my benefits the following month. So receiving money by paypal this month will, I hope, be OK and just past the cut-off point where they won’t even see it. And just in case they do, if people write that it’s a gift, that should help as I am allowed to receive gifts, I’m just not allowed to earn money. I just worry if they do see it and there are gifts from multiple people it might look suspicious. But right now having transport is more important.

No she doesn’t. she doesn’t really use the internet except in unavoidable situations, she’s about to turn 80 and struggles with that sort of thing.

A DWP disability benefit assessor told me I could cure my partial blindness by wearing glasses. When I explained that glasses don’t bring back missing sight, she said I could walk around constantly rotating my head in a circle to give me a full range of vision. This was part of the reasoning used for giving me zero points on my reassessment despite me being in active cancer treatment, recovering from a stroke and recently having become partially sighted.

It’s sad that some people can’t structure themselves without a dead end job though. If I had no money worries and wasn’t disabled I could easily structure my day around hiking, political activism, learning art, reading and other such activities.

I remember a news article years ago about a poor elderly couple who worked in a supermarket. They won millions on the lottery… and kept their jobs. They said the work helped pass the time and all their friends worked there too. I just thought, how sad. You could do anything with that money but you can’t think of anything else to do except stack the shelves and sweep the floors in the same place you’ve been doing for decades.

I feel like the average person would still use this against you, either say “No, I mean what do you do for work?” Or think “Well if you won’t answer the question the way I intended you must be unemployed and therefore worthless.”

your value as a person is defined by how you answer the “so what do you do” question

I feel like this is a huge part of everything that is wrong with our societies. we are expected to be human doings rather than human beings.

This is so true. There is always this assumption that there is a cure, or at least a way to effectively manage, every condition well enough that you can return to work (because returning to work is all that matters, they never care about you being cured so you can be pain-free or have a life) and won’t accept that medical science can’t fix everything already. So you’re treated like it’s a moral failing on your part for still being ill/disabled. A moral failing that you still need help - you’re a lazy scrounger.

If you’ve been ill or disabled for a while, other people get over it. Like when I was diagnosed with cancer, at first people were shocked and offered help, but as my illness wore on and I didn’t get better, these people got bored of it. Soon, it was no longer shocking or exciting to them. I still continue to need help, I am still unwell but everyone I knew drifted away and didn’t bother to stay in touch any more because I’m just some boring disabled person who needs help and isn’t fun any more. They can move on from it but I can’t. And then you get all sorts of shit for still being ill or disabled, like it’s been ages now, time to get a job! Especially from the benefits office, the government and society at large. Like there’s a time limit on being ill or disabled. You’ve been ill or disabled and a drain on society long enough so get a job. Like, what? I’m sorry it’s been a long time but I’m still in active cancer treatment and suffering immense, life-ruining side effects. I can’t just say “It’s been a while now, I’ll get a job.” My cancer treatment caused me to have a stroke and now I can barely even get my own clothes on due to the disabilities I’ve been left with. I’m having multiple foot surgeries, because of infected ulcers caused by the cancer treatment and I’m adjusting to becoming partially sighted but you’re right I have been a drain long enough I am sure there is some job out there where they don’t mind someone who can hardly walk or dress themselves, falls asleep during the day due to exhaustion from cancer treatment, can’t see properly and needs regular time off for hospital appointments and surgery.