I am currently applying for a disability pension with my husband as my carer. I just cannot figure out how I would get a job in the first place. I used to buy and renovate houses but my main arm now has lymphedema so even using a hand saw for any length of time is out. I thought about retraining and perhaps doing a course in selling real estate but I have little short term memory courtesy of chemo brain which looks like instead of the one year to recovery may be the 4 to 10 years’ time frame. My nearest town is 40 mins drive away and with my hubby driving I cannot stay awake in the car either to or from town so driving myself to even volunteer clothes sorting or something menial like that is out. With all of this I have developed depression and I requested to see a psychiatrist who has put me on some medication. This medication also makes me not so much tired but a little disoriented and 'chilled'. Just walking alongside the road in the supermarket carpark my husband had to take my hand yesterday as I was sort of drifting over in front of cars driving past. In the shopping centre, every one passing by me and walking to and fro in front of me had me a little disoriented and my big son had to take my hand and lead me to where we were going. At least I am sleeping better now with no panic attacks from dreams I can’t remember. I only keep waking now from bone aches which is annoying. Apparently it is pretty difficult to get on a disability pension nowadays so I will let you know how we get on.

Brenda - you must be saying to yourself how did my life get so complicated medically! I do hope you find some peace in your treatment regime and you are able to get on top of this and live that somewhere near normal life you had prior to BCTake care and sending you a virtual hug

Hey Brenda, good luck with it. As you said its very difficult to get on it these days, and they are also reviewing lots of people to try and take them off it.

It's a points system Brenda and if you get letters from your doctors confirming depression, lymphoedema,chemo brain etc you may find it adds up.Good luck

You heading down a road some of the rest of us will have to travel. Good luck. Xxx

Hi Brenda good luck. Dealing with centerlink is a nightmare. My husband was allocated a carers allowance but I wasnt given a disability pension. If you are not successful it wont be because you dont deserve it ,it is their rules and regulations and how you fit in to their criteria. Mention the side effects of the medication to your psychiatrist. They may prescribe another medication or reduce the dose you are taking. I found the people I dealt with at centerlink good but the system is terrible. Lets hope they see reason. Nothing lasts forever. Over time things do pick up. Like the shampoo commercial it wont happen overnight but it will happen .Heres to your health improving and better days

Disability pension | BCNA Online Network

melclarity
Member
8 years ago
@Vicki_S I agree with you, a visit to the Naturopath was a major turning point in my recovery from Chemo, I would never have thought!!! so worth a consult. xx
Vicki_S
Member
8 years ago
Hi Brenda, centrelink is such a painful process. I have just applied for sickness benefit as i have not worked since March. As I've heard getting a disp pension is impossible, tho if you're a drug addict that is classed as a dissabilty because they can't get jobs?? arrrhh :s
Can you get a low income health care card? big savings like discounted rego, power bills etc. Is better than nothing :)
I recently saw a natropath to help me get over chemo and get me fighting fit for THE BIG surgery, very glad I did!! She wants to see me after the surgery to help with my anxiety and depression.
Brenda5
Member
8 years ago
No not yet. He said 2 years on Tamoxifen. Last appointment he seemed to have forgotten that and was tossing up 5 or 10 years. I think male oncologists should have to take a couple months of Tamoxifen before they practice. My GP also seems to think its all a big joke. He's wierd.
Nearly missed an invite to the neighbors today. Thank goodness I remembered the invitation long enough to get home and put it on the calendar where my husband remembered for me because 24 hours later I had totally and utterly forgotten.
primek
Member
8 years ago
@Brenda5 Have they considered swapping you to an aramatose inhibitor instead of tamoxifen to see if your memory improves?
Brenda5
Member
8 years ago
I hear you. It is like I have a brain that's gone from Windows 10 down to commodore 64 and dial up. It's just so frustrating and at first it really upset me but now I know that one day I will be completed with the Tamoxifen and hopefully cancer free for decades. I just hope the brain cells straighten up and fly right.
Zoffiel
Member
8 years ago
@Brenda5
It's just taken me three days to enrol in my uni course. I'm surprised, given the production I have made out of what should be a relatively simple exercise, that they haven't withdrawn the offer. I feel like a complete fool; the poor bloody woman trying to coach me through filling in the forms must be thinking 'WTF?" I could hear the tech support persons' eyes rolling from over 200km away as they tried to get me online.

I found the whole business so stressful that I was up most of the night second guessing myself and absolutely cringing at poorly I must have presented--this is not what I am used to. How I am going to handle that level of study is a mystery at the moment, I'll just have to make it up as I go along.

Guess what though, I will NOT give up. Don't you give up either. If it takes a week to learn a line of lyrics, it takes a week. That week will pass regardless of how you spend the time so you may as well have another bit of a song stashed in your melon at the end of it.

Do what you can and it will have to be enough but, please, never believe it can't get just a little bit better.
Afraser
Member
8 years ago
I suspect most people have no idea of the severity of the condition, or that chemo brain is not always a temporary affliction. I dreaded it even for a few months (and was OK) but it's hit and miss. Most people get their hair back, but not everyone - at least not always in a functional way. No-one having chemo needs to be scared more than they usually are, at the outset anyway, but maybe long lasting impacts have to be renamed for what they are - conditions that severely limit your options and capacity, no matter how hard you may try to overcome it and not "just" a chemo side effect. Same with lymphoedema - mine is OK but Brenda's is another limiting factor and is unlikely to spontaneously improve. If you cured something by removing a limb, the disability would be clear and obvious.
Brenda5
Member
8 years ago
It's mostly the chemo brain memory thing. It never recovered. I could not tell you what i did yesterday or what netflix show i watched even. I have to write every thing down in a note book as I will forget it. I tried to learn a song lyrics and didnt want this chemo brain to win. It took me two weeks to learn the first line! A win for me, since I can still remember it. I havent learned the second line yet lol. I would love to do a course of some sort or uni or a small business but if it takes two weeks to learn one line of song lyrics I haven't got a hope doing a course.
fairydust
Member
8 years ago
@Brenda5 centerlink prides itself on being understaffed and superslow to get back. That has been my experience in the past. It wouldnt hurt dropping in if possible to ask about the status of your claim.
I also have recently seen a naturopath. I was in the chemist spoke to an assistant who happened to be a naturopath.
I arranged an appointment. Turns out her stepson had just survived leukemia and was a 3 year survivor. She understood about fatigue and health issues related to cancer.
The point of this is she prescribed pills that help the nervous system.I have a fair bit of depression at the moment.
She then also prescribed tablets to improve the flora of my gut. After a week or so gradually feeling better.
A naturopath consult may help I to in the past had bad side effects with anti depressants.
Zoffiel
Member
8 years ago
Ah Brenda, it's the little things that can really break your heart. We cope with all the big ticket items, then the shitty little bits bring us undone.
My heart goes out to you, it is soo hard when all you want to do is get on with your life and nothing will go right. The Tamoxifen may be to blame, it may not. Sometimes the medication that we think is the culprit isn't the root of the problem, it could be just our age or stage of life and the problems may have been the same regardless of the cancer. Which doesn't help, I know.
Can you get to another Centrelink office? It sounds like someone isn't doing their job where ever you started out. I know, it's a pain in the butt to get to another location, but it may be worth it if you seem to have dropped off the radar.