No 4 point PIP descriptors results
| Submission ID: 1162411 |
| Date: 2025-04-08 19:50:48 |
| Nickname: Jess |
| Age: 48 |
| Main health condition: Both physical and mental health |
| Main conditions that affect daily living: Arthritis, Lymphodema, Chronic pain, Chronic fatigue, Bipolar, PTSD, Diabetes, Sleep Apnea. |
| Rate of PIP daily living component: Standard |
| 4 point descriptor score: No |
| Possibility to score at least one 4-point daily living descriptor at the next review: I don't know. I should score at least 4 for cooking and for managing therapies but have not so far. I did not challenge this as I score enough for the higher rate under the current rules. Now I fear that will be used against me at my next review. |
| Tasks you struggle with on a day-to-day basis: I live alone and have no family. I have been referred to social services twice as I am struggling to keep on top of housework as I can barely walk and cannot stay standing for more than a few seconds at a time. Despite my council adapting my bathroom, pain and mental illness means I struggle to shower regularly or clean myself as thoroughly as I would like. I get respiratory infections from my therapy machine as I do not clean it regularly enough. I forget to take my medication, even though the chemist prepares it for me. I eat mostly cold pre-prepared food and have a lot of trouble managing my diabetes (in the past week I have had several nights with serious life-threatening hypoglycaemia). I live in a cloud of confusion and feel like every day is a constant fight to get through. There is never a point where it is okay, where it doesn't hurt, where I am comfortable, where I have managed everything I need to manage. |
| Expected income you will lose if the Green Paper cuts are imposed: I would lose £110.40 per week, and I would struggle to pay my bills. My electricity and heating bill is quite high because of the equipment I have to run and because it is dangerous for me to be cold. I will lose more if loss of the Daily Living component is tied to losing the LCWRA element of universal credit. If I still retain my mobility PIP, I fear I would have to end my motability chair so that I could meet my bills, and then I would be completely housebound, with no one checking on me, unable to get to the health appointments I rely upon to mitigate my poor health. I am afraid that would exacerbate my health conditions and I would die alone, bedbound, without anyone being aware of it, and it is that thought that leads to me wondering if I should stop it before it goes that far, before I lose the ability to decide when, and how. |
| Expected problems if you tried moving into work, with support from a work coach: I am struggling to exist and attend all the appointments I need to attend to manage my disabilities. I often turn up on the wrong day or time or place, or don't turn up at all. I think that adding work to the mix would be disastrous and I think it would drive me to suicide. I am already actively terrified of the DWP. I find that they make my health conditions worse via stress. I think I would experience an employer the same way, as they need reliability and I can't give them that. I can't even give myself that. |
| Anything else to tell us: I am finding the discourse and the uncaring attitude of the government very frightening. It is very clear that they have an unconscious bias against disabled people and that they think we are less worthy of life, any kind of life, even the one I am struggling with right now. They are equating being disabled with a moral failing, and there is no escape. I, and all disabled people like me, are at the mercy of people who would rather we were dead. I feel it keenly. I made a special effort to complete this form in the hope that it might reach someone, that my voice might be heard, but I can no longer hear about these things as it is becoming very dangerous for me. Half of my immediate family have taken their own lives. I fear I will be next, and it won't be a failing of mine, it will be a moral failing of those who have already closed their hearts to empathy for others for the sake of less than one percent of government spending. How much are each of our lives worth? How much of the five billion is my life worth? A million, a thousand, a hundred... or ten pounds? I fear that many of us will be driven to death for less than MPs claim for breakfast. |
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