Full Time Care

Things are slowly getting back to ‘normal’ here, not that normal in this case is very normal at all, but you know what I mean. My partner managed to do her workout today, which is excellent, but still has that bizarre obsession in her head: that her parents are going to appear on our doorstep. I don’t get it. I mean, she’s not a raving lunatic or anything, but she just can’t let that go. Thankfully, rather than turning to a bottle, she went to bed.

So I went off into town this afternoon to do some food shopping and drop off a letter for our government benefits. Here in the UK it’s all centralised these days, and the system sucks. I can say that with a small amount of authority, since the job I just lost was… processing claims for benefits!

I originally did the whole process back in December, but I called them this week to ask that they have a look, since I happen to know that my file will just sit there otherwise. In my case, only the boss can do the claim - because everyone there knows me, they’re not allowed to process the forms. That’d be considered rather risky on the favouritism front. Turns out they not only haven’t bothered processing anything to do with incapacity (despite my clearly asking for it in my original claim and again on the telephone), but they’ve turned down my carer’s allowance application. That’s a different department, so not their fault.

This means I had to write up a description of how much caring I do, how it affects my life and so on: I don’t mind doing it, but these things always look soooo dramatic on paper. “Risk of self-harm” and “Cannot leave the house alone” are pretty loaded phrases, after all. Thankfully, I just deal with it and my lady doesn’t ever have to see anything I write. She’d throw a wobbler if she did.

At least it’s dealt with now - I delivered the letter myself this afternoon. We might finally get some money to live on. Woohoo!

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