Disabled person accused of falsifying and exaggerating their disabling conditions

InvisibleDisabled777

Hello. I am a 44 old female with multiple disabling neurological, physical and mental health conditions, which are not obviously visible, but have been medically diagnosed and proved. My most disabling conditions are:

- still medically uncomfortable very frequent Epileptic seizures, due to a non malignant tumour in brain, mainly triggered by warm air conditions, pain and usage of computer, tablet, phone;

- medically uncontrollable Migrainous vertigos, also triggered by warm air conditions and pain;

- Severe back fibromyalgia, still not giving to any painkillers. Plus doctors can't find the exact cause of it. I also developed partial body paralysis daily episodes, where I lose control of my hands and legs out of the blue, no any warning signs. Doctors still can't figure out the cause of it and how to deal with it.

Due to that, I have very limited mobility, I have to spend a lot of time in bed to keep myself safe from injuries while collapsing, have a very limited cognitive abilities. I have been requiring the assistance of another adult with my basic daily living tasks for over 5 years.

I am also a single mother (divorced 2.5 years ago) raising an 8 y.o. daughter, who has various health issues, including quite worsening mental health issues, which she had since birth. However, due to CAMHS still refusing to accept any referrals from GPs, Paediatricians, Early help practitioners and even relevant school representatives, my daughter still doesn't have any official diagnosis of her mental health state.

My daughters health issues are causing her frequently missing or coming late to school.

Local Child Protection Social services, alongside with representatives of school, Attendance officers and Social workers, arranged the conference to discuss need of placing my daughter under Child under protection plan due to parental neglect in a form of falsifying and exaggerating her health issues and intentionally preventing her from her right to education. Just because there are no official diagnosis of her mental health state and the letters from hospital professionals about her other two serious health issues, mostly affecting her school attendance, do not say in it that due to her conditions she can miss the school.

Being a severely disabled person and my overall health condition getting worse, I most definitely do not deny the negative impact that living with me has on her mental health state. I do not object her being under Child under protection plan. One thing is the Conference parties claiming that I am intentionally convincing my child that she is ill, even though they did not observe that during their meeting with her and she is not showing any unusual signs of it while being at school. But they also accused me of exaggerating and potentially falsifying my own disabling conditions, even though there are plenty medical letters proving it, on top of the fact that 5 years ago I've been approved for PIP, who do very deep, thorough checks, including in person medical assessment by DWP representatives. They were sitting there and laughing into my face, when I said that I need assistance of another adult with daily living and mobility tasks. They started asking why don't I try harder to do all those tasks by myself and this way I won't have to pretend being disabled and exaggerate my actual health issues.

Such behaviour left me in enormous emotional distress, plus the obvious physical distress from having to go there and sit for 2.5 hours in excruciating multiple pains and experiencing multiple seizures, which they couldn't see, because they are invisible to others, plus I was trying all my best to hold myself so that not to disturb the conference, which I was forced to learn in order to keep my child in as little distress as possible.

All this caused my body go into complete withdrawal later in the day and I came back to my limited existence just a few hours ago.

Am I really over-reacting to this or am I right thinking that it was some sort of unfair emotional abuse towards me as a disabled person?

Is there any way to deal with such behaviour from the participants of the conference?

Feel free to express your opinion whatever it is. I am just still in a state of shock after how I was treated.

Rosie_Scope

Hi @InvisibleDisabled777, welcome to the community. That all sounds really difficult to cope with. Facing health issues every day is hard enough without people accusing you of exaggerating your conditions, I'm really sorry that happened to you.

If you feel you were treated unfairly, could you perhaps make a complaint about the people who were making comments about your health? Most schools and agencies will have a complaints process that they have to follow.

One thing that might also be worth a try is contacting the Equality Advisory and Support Service to see if they have any advice on your rights in this kind of situation: https://www.equalityadvisoryservice.com/

I hope you've had a chance to rest and recover after what you've been through.

66Mustang

If what you say is factual then I think you could totally throw them under the bus, especially as they are supposed to be trusted to deal with vulnerable children