Category: blahblahblah

How being on the DSP has allowed me to stabilise my mental health

I was approved for the disability support pension about two years ago now. It wasn’t a straightforward process, and I was initially rejected, with my request for a review going through successfully without any more information from me. So, how has being on DSP improved my quality of life?

Slightly more money – the partnered DSP rate is currently $826.70 per fortnight, $140 more than the $686.00 I’d be getting on JobSeeker. (source DSS 2023) The difference for singles is more – $347.50 a fortnight extra to use to pay for the basics of life, costs which all agree are more with a disability – studies showing that you need at least 50% more disposable income to live with a disability in Australia. Not that any of the DSP gets to be disposable.

Getting off the Disability Employment Services radar – I’ve had a lot of exemptions from job searching in my time on payments, so for me this meant there was no looming date where I’d have to reengage with DES or have to get a correctly written medical certificate from my non-bulk billing doctor to have them waived again. This was a huge stress relief, not having to apply for jobs I wasn’t ready for, and not having to show up to fortnightly appointments to talk about how my life was falling apart this week and how a minimum wage cleaning job was clearly what I needed to fix my mental health.

Did you know under-35s on DSP have mutual obligations these days? Any disabled person who is failing to meet their “obligations” and getting cut of their payments is clearly being failed by the services that are supposed to be supporting them.

TIME and SPACE – time and space to do the therapies that I was already involved in. When I got DSP, I was doing 4 sessions a week of various therapies – individual and group – for borderline personality disorder and alcohol dependence. I could now just focus on these for awhile. So, I certainly wasn’t sitting at home on DSP, I was doing therapy in person and online, I was practicing getting out and about into the world again after a breakdown that coincided with Covid routine changes and added stresses. I’ve been sober 3 three years now, and certainly the support of having the DSP and not having to meet others expectations around employment have let me maintain that even amongst the rest of the chaos that life brings.

Time and space to figure me out and pursue my own interests and use my skills. I also started to learn the confidence to pace myself properly – I had a therapy goal that was basically following through on things I committed to. Which is two sided – both not chickening out with anxiety or low energy when it all gets too much, but also not letting it get to much – knowing my schedule, knowing how much and what sorts of things I can commit to and only pushing myself as far as I should go. Not saying yes because it’s expected of me, but giving things a go and seeing if they do spark joy. It’s amazing how much energy expenditure varies when you are following an interest!

Time and space to prioritise my “little routine”, allowing myself to see getting up and dressed or putting away the washing as an achievement, and being happy with my day. If I get my little routine together, if I do my chore, make my dinners, then I have more time and space mentally and practically to do more of the things that are generally seen as productive – supporting friends and family, writing and advocacy, maybe even doing a little bit of paid work here and there!

There’s so many goals I’m starting to see as achievable for myself after having this period of self-stability. It’s allowed me to try new things, put my hand up to do things I care about and feel are important, with the knowledge that I don’t have to meet someone else’s expectations to get paid each fortnight. I don’t know if I’ll make it back to earning enough to no longer get the pension, I’d love to do more, be more independent financially, actually have a disposable income, but I have time now. Time and space to dip in and out of the outside world as I can in a way that is of benefit to both myself and everyone else near and dear to me.

I’m certainly not “fixed”. I’m starting with a new psych, but being on DSP means that that would be prohibitively expensive if I hadn’t been able to get in with one that I can see for free for 10 sessions, but only on a Thursday and only from April. I also need to properly explore my neurodivergence, somehow find the energy and the money to get assessed for Autism and ADHD, especially if that would help me at all when it comes with getting even more okay with living in this world.

Just needed to breathe.

Three Years Sober

Three years ago I have a week or so gap in my photo backups from when I was on ward after a 6 or so week relapse and trying to take myself out with meds. So yeah, haven’t had a drink since about this time 3 years ago. Been back on antabuse all that time, and not drinking and yeah, go me and all that.

It’s been a weird week, went to Sydney for Kflay on wednesday. Been waiting and anticipating for so long it was perfect and sweaty and I was up front, smooshed behind the people at the front. I wonder if I’ll regret smooshing and not wearing a mask but it was a great gig and like every gig I go to I crash hard afterward from the physical and mental exertion, the late night , the travel and the adrenalin. Let’s see if I brought home covid and I get to suffer through that. I’ll do my out of date tests every couple of days and see (I mean if I get it I’ll likely know without that) I wish you could still get drive through covid tests free. Or at least RATs in date.

Caught up with a friend, an ex, which was awkward and yeah, I don’t know, it’s hard to catch up with people.

Did the Antipoverty centre meeting, officially co-secretary and am pumped for the year ahead.

Waiting on blood test results from the tests my new GP ordered. I don’t really have reason to worry but I always worry. And want to get off to a good start with the new doc lol. There’s thing I wanna be able to bring up with her. Again nothing urgent but things I should.

Oh and I weighed less than I estimated at the pathologists. Cool. Now just to move more, I just want a routinnnnnnnnnnne

Anyway, send me presents and call me pretty:

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paypal.me/phonakins

amazon.com.au/hz/wishlist/ls

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Where we at?

Got a rental inspection this Tuesday so tidying up. Yeah it’s soon, but I’ve generally had one a month after moving into a new place. We’ve already got it to a way better cleanliness standard than what we moved into, and Bruce has done amazing things in the yard. So as long as they don’t care about the burnt patch of lino from my little fire day two here, all it good. Sounds like Bruce’s kids and their mum finally have to move out of their place, so I’m crossing my fingers and toes for them to find a suitable rental.

Nobody Deserves Poverty

Still no internet. Called TPG this morning at the suggestion of NBN to see if there was any sooner install dates, no there isn’t Feb 29 is sooner than any others that are available – March 11 is where you’d be booked in for now. I also asked for a wireless dongle and they’re sending one with 60gig a month for three months on it – it’s more for Bruce than for me, his phone either isn’t liking being tethered all the time or was dying either way.

Trying to do little things that are really big things to work towards my goals this year. Got a busy Valentine’s Day coming up with the Kflay concert I’ve been dying for down at the Oxford Arts Factory! Gotta figure out how to do the Antipoverty Centre AGM before that – prolly just on my phone and get to Sydney early or something. We’ll see. I’m putting myself forward for a board role, so we’ll see how that goes. I’m actually nominating ahead unlike basically gatecrashing the AUWU AGM and elections and being relieved I missed out on the ordinary member role on their committee of management. Those selected are awesome and certainly deserved it.

One of the things I said I want to be able to do is go down to Sydney for things and be safe and sober and trust myself and be trusted by my partner. It’s been nearly three years since I’ve had a drink, and don’t really want to. But not yet to the point of coming off the Antabuse. Maybe this year.

Looks like I’m going to be doing more on the Nobody Deserves Poverty campaign this year too, at least up until the May Budget. Most Australians don’t think anyone does deserve to live in poverty, but seem to still excuse their politicians keeping welfare payments below the poverty line, so hopefully we can get more mainstream discussion on that (ugh, Facebook), get people talking about it and too their reps, get more organisations to sign on and push for welfare rates to be lifted above the poverty line in the May Budget. ALL payments, because yes, Jobseeker and Youth allowance are appallingly low, but carers, parenting and pensions are also still below the poverty line. A rising tide lifts all ships. And we need more voices of Welfare recipients in pollies’ ears when they’re still making comments about $180k not being a lot…

Nobody Deserves Poverty

We sold the AU so we now have money to repair the other Ford. And I can justify going full Hello Kitty on the Corolla. If you wanna help with the HelloKittyfication, there’s some items on my wishlist that would be sweet additions. That also means that some days I’m carless so really miss the NBN more and can’t wait til Feb 29 and decent internet and streaming my favourite games – hunting wabbits in Red Dead online and grinding in GTA. I have a couple of games I’ve downloaded to play offline, but I miss those one s in particular.

Opinion Pieces Wednesday, 19th January 2022 No one left behind in Labor blueprint for better future First published in the Australian on Jan 18 2022

“What about me?” It’s cliché but what we’re working with here

“As Labor politicians head to Canberra to discuss #CostOfLiving, #FOI reveals that, in the last 12 months, neither Minister Rishworth, Shorten or Collins have received briefings, reports or analyses on the effects of the cost-of-living crisis on welfare recipients. #fail #auspol”

Yeah, of course they haven’t. They run inquiries, make statements and chat to charities but don’t actually care about what it’s like to try to survive on welfare in this county.

Youth allowance is clearly the worst. with the politicians assuming you can both rely on your parents but they can’t have too much for you to be eligible. And it’s up til 24 years old… because we all know that you get a kids discount on food and rent til 24. Oh what, that was 12 for the kids meal? My bad.

The next table shows JobSeeker rates. $686 a fortnight if you’re partnered and your partner doesn’t earn much at all. $802.50 for singles. How DO people look for work on less than $50/day? or even on $57?

I get $59/day on DSP and I don’t have to leave the house and participate in society. Oh, I should be able to? Tell that to the cost of living committee.

And rent assistance? $85/week that just pushes up rents and makes it impossible for those not already receiving it to enter the rental market? Zoe, you have no idea, you think that it’s just a nice little supplement when really it’s just 18% of my rent. Forgive me for not being all grateful for the $13 a week extra I got just before my rent went up $60/week and we had to spend thousands moving.

I’m not feeling coherent yet, I’m only on my first diet coke, I didn’t sleep well and people were being loud and had the tv on this morning and I can’t process all that before say 10am.

I emailed Foodbank seeking more information about how donations work and who pays for what and why some places charge customers and some places aren’t allowed to but I didn’t get a response. I emailed TPG asking for use of a wifi modem til my innernet gets installed on Feb 29 and I didn’t get a response. I emailed Dan Repacholi to ask his to ask for an increase to welfare at the crisis meeting tomorrow but he just said he’s find out what was going to happen at the meeting himself and pass it on. Don’t shoot the messenger, even if he can shoot himself.

I’ll leave you with Nollsy while you email your local MP what would make a difference to you this cost of living crisis in the vain hope that they even have input into the process:

25 degrees at 8am

What do you mean it was hot last night? I mean it was warm though the day, but it just didn’t cook down. And here’s the proof from the Govee tracker I have set up in my bedroom to report back to Better Renting’s summer tracking.

And this was after Bruce put the aircon back on in the living room around 3am to hopefully push some relief down the hallway to us. We had our ceiling fan and Bunnings fan going all night, window was open, closed it when the aircon went back on, but no luck. No wonder I had to strip off and woke up feeling dehydrated and grumpy.

The news keep talking about the humidity and the high dew point, and yeah, while the temp’s only been a tad over thirty you start dripping when you leave your car or and other aircon. Even had the fogging up glasses going in one transition this morning!

So I don’t know the best approach. Our new home has an air con in the living room, where we spend our days so we use that. But we’d gotten used to having the aircon in the sleeping area from sleeping in the living room at the last place after the kids and bub moved in. We have a spare queen mattress from the bed that’s not assembled so we could drag that to the living room for the next month or so for spells sleeping out here. The mattress is okay but not ideal like that.

Decisions decisions.

a frozen fruit

In the mean time, it’s snacks of Frozen Poppers and Zooper Doopers to keep the sugar and the spirits up. At least Zooper Doopers were half price when I was at woolies yesterday!