I don’t have a lot of people to turn to, never really have… I’ve been pretty isolated most of my life, so I’ve just sort of muddled through by reading a lot and trying to figure out how to deal with stuff on my own.
But I’m not really sure how to handle this. I’m disabled and have been most of my life, and I haven’t really let it stop me for the most part. It gets in the way, but I brute force my way through. Often to my own detriment.
I guess I’m not doing as well as I thought… I’m applying for a disability upgrade, and one of the things I can submit is statements in support of my claim, letters from the people around me about how my disability impacts my life, and theirs. If this doesn’t sound like a normal disability process that’s because this is the VA service-connected disability process, rather than a normal one.
Anyway, I asked a couple of my closest friends to write something up about how they have seen the impacts, and it low-key hurt my soul to read. Reading how they have been negatively impacted by my limitations, and how they view what I go through has been the worst kind of eye opening.
And I’m not sure how to deal with that, or even where to look.
If you’ve got motherly or fatherly advice, if you’ve been through similar, if you’ve been through something else hard, please feel free to share. Anything helps.
That’s a good way to frame it, thank you. They are providing me an excellent reference for the position I really need to be in. I hate needing to ask for help in the first place (support has been lacking in my life) and that probably makes this whole thing feel worse.
I have AutDHD, and rejection sensitive dysphoria, to boot, so I’m a bit of a sensitive mess about stuff, however that’s also why I sometimes like to get outside thoughts before I act on any of it. I know I’m a sensitive mess and I want to reframe things so I can approach them properly.
Most of what they mentioned I knew, and I know they played it up for the sake of the job. There were some things I hadn’t considered because they didn’t seem connected to me. They made some connections that have me on that introspection ride, and dealing with that has been the major challenge. I’ve always asked people to be honest and upfront with me and it feels like maybe they haven’t been, but maybe because it doesn’t rise to the level of concern. I don’t know, and I don’t know if it’s worth pursuing.
Seeing an exaggeration of my burden hurts too, but I literally asked for that. I can’t fault them for delivering. One sent me multiple drafts and asked if they should add more, because they had a lot to say. And I said write as much as you want, they have to read it all.