Low amount of social services support

Thank you Anneb, I really appreciate hearing your thoughts on this. I think it is quite a dilemma for many of us here on the forum and an ongoing worry.

Thanks again,
Wendy

Hi Anneb and Wendy Woo

Thank you for sharing. It seems that I am lucky to be getting 2 hours! I think Social Services have given me the lowest possible hours they can get away with, and only because I kicked up a stink and put in a complaint. Because I naively thought that LAs are supposed to follow the laws and regulations and uphold our legal rights with regards to care.

Your stories are horrifying. The Autism Act and Care Act are supposed to provide access for autistic people to access the community and have a life! It shouldn't be like this and it certainly shouldn't be more stress and time than it's worth. I am really sorry that you - we - have been so let down. When I have my PIP review I will explain that Social Services up and down the country allow autistic people to fall through the gaps. I live in a major city, and the Council is only just putting together an adult autism team in spite of it being over a decade since the Autism Act was published. I guess as a response to the rise in diagnoses of people like me. I have always needed help but never had any other than bits from my (lovely) parents. I think because I'm intelligent, people don't believe I struggle whereas in fact I have in the past tried to take my own life and have had episodes of terrible depression on top of anxiety.

Maybe you should write to your MPs and ask them to make sure Social Services know about your respective sons. Trying to get them involved now in planning future care possibilities. At the very least, a letter to your MP would highlight a problem with services.

I too can relate to this my autistic son who was diagnosed in his late teens only had a couple of years support from CAMHS then at 18 yrs they washed their hands of him saying he’s not got enough mental health issues to be transferred to adult social care .
With no help i applied for pips which helped with extra english maths tuition as he stopped attending school however he still didn’t do exams due to lack of any support, driving lessons ( he passed with help of a friends brother who was an instructor but he only drove for a few times afterwards)
He lost the pips award a few years later and I couldn’t face re applying
Had an assessor who had no idea about autism .
Just recently ,over 10 yrs later (panicking as me and his dad are getting older what would happen to him ) i reapplied for PIPS and was told i needed to be an appointee
The meeting went smoothly and he was very understanding of autism and how it affects the process of claiming
So fingers crossed however im not looking forward to filling out the form
In the past i asked for help from social prescribing from gp who gave a few telp calls to me as he wont talk on phone ( never met us face to face ) and posted a few leaflets to us but his lack of motivation ,acrophobia and social anxiety and input from any other service prevented him from having any social input/life other than his computer and close family.
I tried to get him assessed by social services ,quite a few years ago but he refused to see anyone
I feel that young people with autism are really let down if only CHAMS had continued their help by referring him on he might have has so many different experiences and achievements in his life