Had a 1 hour appt via phone with Universal Credit today.

The advisor asking what can she do to support my autistic 19 yr old daughter into a full time job or find a 2nd job or gain confidence by attending college as well as keep her part time job .

All the messages I have left on the UC journal stating my daughter's difficulties due to autism, the fit notes from the GP, doesn't seem to stop the passive aggressive attitude of UC advisors who seem determined to force my daughter into full time work by box ticking DWP workers.

There was an offer of an Access to Work grant. I am so ground down by this UC system, I asked her to send on info via email. The call finished at 16 minutes. I will be called again in December and January for a decision of whether to accept the Access to work support.

I'm biting my tongue not to tell the advisor to where to stick their "support".... Their support and my daughter's needs are very different.

It would be easier to give up on hoping for any financial support from the DWP. But why should we? It's our entitlement.

Phone appt 9.30am with Universal Credit work coach. It's 9.48am and still no phonecall.

Received a fit note from GP for autistic daughter via email.

I need to print it out and add in her National Insurance number.

Library is closed as now only open part time and shop that does print outs is closed again due to family bereavement.

Why does the DWP expect claimants to have their own office equipment or spend on print outs when already on a low budget?

Feeling rather anxious. All my universal credit has been cancelled. I have lived on 340 pound every month since July. Every day is stressful.

There is a lot of talk and rumours around concerning the Child Poverty Strategy which will soon be announced and also the review into Universal Credit that is taking place. Hopefully this will ease the burden of poverty on many families. However, I am concerned about some of the language being used and also the lack of interest in those of us that still receive payments under the Legacy Benefit System. There is a lot of wording around working families and that Universal Credit is to help work pay. There are many people that are single parents or part of a family that have various mental or physical disabilities that are unable to work, who are largely being ignored and not seen as being worthy of a standard way of living. On top of this, I do understand that people like myself who still receive Legacy benefit payments while on Universal credit do get an allowance that was to stop us losing money when benefit rules and rates were changed some years ago. However, this ultimately means that these benefits are not increased in line with other benefits and will therefore not increase this any increases that may be announced in the coming months. Ultimately - particularly due to the rising cost of living - this results in the money we have coming in being eroded with every single increase in food, utility bills, broadband, clothing etc. This must not be allowed to continue. Groups of people like this spend a lot more time at home often alone, unable to afford the cost of keeping warm and eating healthy food, making our lives unbearable, resulting in worsening mental and physical health conditions which ends up causing more pressure on the health service which is money much needed in other parts of the NHS. We must all continue to fight for change in making society fair for all not just fair for those who are able to work.

Yesterday I heard back from our Council to say that they could not support us with the discretionary housing grant that is designed to cover a shortfall in rent because the shortfall is too large! I'm not sure how that makes sense. It is almost impossible to find anywhere to rent in our county and when you do nowhere is any cheaper than the rent on our house, the Council will know this. They did give me £6 a week of of my council tax though! I don't get why people have to pay council tax when they can't afford to eat or heat their home or pay their rent.

At the moment the cost of groceries is so extortionate that you can’t even make a sandwich, even something so simple like cheese and ham. You have to choose between either cheese or ham and when you’ve got two children that have sensory processing and one of them doesn’t eat cheese and the other one doesn’t eat ham you end up just buying a loaf of bread because you can’t afford all three. How is this right in the world that we live in? I actually fear that we will be living on porridge oats because at the moment I’ve not been able to eat dinner at all because we cannot afford food. Supermarkets have just announced record profits and paid themselves nice salaries. This is not acceptable and no one seems to be taking account and no one seems to be showing any sense of urgency considering this has been going on since the pandemic. What’s going to happen when it actually gets to the point that we can’t even afford a loaf of bread? What are we going to eat????

I have been thinking about how women earn less than men and also do most of the household chores and take responsibility for most of the childcare and maybe older adult care later on. This is a huge part of what has put me and my children into poverty and also kept me there. My ex-husband refused to do part of the childcare with me so that I could return to work. He later left me for another woman he met at work, and left me with his three children. I could never return to my career, I could only do work that functioned with the needs of three children. I made lots of self employed work for myself that meant I could take them with me. Caring 100% for my three children severely limited my earning capabilities, my energy levels, my health, my social life, my confidence, everything. Now I have one child still at home, at college. My older daughter has been in work for

three years following uni and the middle one is at uni but also works, the youngest is in college and applying to uni. My parenting has benefited the economy, my kids are clever, kind and productive members of society. I have now entered the very challenging and transformative phase of perimenopause and my life no longer functions in the way it did all of those years. Maybe I have also burned myself out. I am now off work with mental health and fatigue issues and now our UC only just covers rent. I must confess to wondering what my life has all been for. I literally sacrificed my own life to raise children with no support, financial, political, parental or otherwise. I hope that they will all be ok but it looks as if I will not. This transformative hormonal phase does not look like I will be becoming the wise wild woman that we are promised. I am living in more precarity than ever. How can this be ok? What about all the unpaid work that I have done in raising and caring for three children on my own? Now I don't know when I can buy some more milk!

It's school half term and in a number of boroughs, children on free school meals get an e-voucher to help their families over the half term. It is strictly for food and groceries, meant to reflect the additional food shopping parents will do with their children at home. It used to be £20 per child, then it went to £15 earlier this year...now it's £10. This is due to "budget cuts", we are told. That the voucher value has been halved when costs for many food items have doubled, tripled and even quadrupled in the same time period, is just galling. That £10 will still be desperately used, but it's gone as soon as it's looked at because it is too little money! It makes you wonder...is everyone in the UK suffering loss after loss like this? Whose purse is growing while the budget for hungry children has been slashed yet again?

We finally have a date for my child's EHCP tribunal - over a year away. But all the paperwork is meant to be in by February, meaning all of the assessments will be out of date by the time we get to tribunal. Legal aid will only pay for one assessment so we will have to find the money for updates.

Have been thinking about your mental health and poverty campaign and how important it is. I wonder how many people stuck in the poverty pipeline are there due to poor mental health. If you struggle with not enough resources, so many of the helpful and protective factors known to support with mental health are just not available. I unfortunately have found myself in perimenopause and struggling with many issues but in particular my mental health. I have been a successful and hard working human for many years and all of a sudden I have been hit with this under-researched and underfunded but very natural phase of life that is this hormonal transition. The available support is nil where we live as the only menopause specialist in the county was cut a few years ago and we have no menopause clinics in the whole of the wider region. I can't get the help that I need and I have been told so many times that I should take SSRI antidepressants for symptoms that are hormonal.

I have been off of work for most of the year. I changed jobs at the end of last year thinking it would be a better move for my changing body and mind but it was worse and was like I hit a brick wall at speed. I have been able to claim UC but also because of where we live, it only just covers the rent! My youngest daughter and I are in a sad situation where we just don't have the luxury of making even fairly simple choices that make life better. I am not able to buy food that will support my mental health, meet anyone socially, drive to places that are beautiful to walk in, get therapy or counselling, swim, have new clothes, celebrate birthdays, join clubs, actually just join in generally. It's a really miserable existence even without the actual mental health struggles. I have just got off of the phone from my GP who again has suggested SSRI's. They have nothing they can offer and they know it and know it's not o.k. What tools can you have in your mental health tool box if you don't have money to heat your house or buy food? Health generally but particularly good mental health is a privilege that anyone on UC just can't afford.

I applied for social housing through a housing association and have been successful. I asked my current letting agent of my rented flat for a reference and was shocked to be charged £30. I don’t have much disposable income £30 is a weeks shopping. I can’t believe they can charge this. Given I’m a single mum, and have been on housing benefits my entire tenancy, I just find it really shocking. It takes 5 minutes to draft up the truth of my tenancy which is rent paid in full and on time, no antisocial behaviour. The opportunity for my rent to go down by almost £300 by moving into social rent and it being a new build property is that is energy efficient means I can pay more towards energy arrears, and get myself out of the mess I am in. Why should I have to pay £30 for the truth of how I am as a tenant!