Ok so I’ve put my hard hat on for this one, and name changed too for privacy, here it goes…
To avoid drip feeding- I’m a single parent to two children, one of whom has physical disabilities and additional needs.
I’ve had a meeting today with DS’s Occupational Therapist and they’re signing him off! His present set of treatments will be his last for the foreseeable future. This combined with his physical therapy completing at the end of last year, means my diary is looking pretty clear! The issue is, I only work part time to deal with all these appointments. Up until Last year, we had at least two regular appointments a week, plus additional paediatric appointments, meetings with school, and social workers.
Because of this, I made the decision during covid to reduce my hours down to part time. Not ideal, but the combination of my part time wage, universal credits and child DLA, means I actually make about £30 a month more than when I was working full time. it means I’ve been available for every appointment, every meeting, all school events and even had chance to catch up on housework sometimes. I’m also on the school PTA board and volunteer for one of my son’s supporter charities
so, now that our appointments are reducing, I was quite excitedly looking at increasing my works hours. Except, when I’ve looked on an online calculator, I’d actually be less well off each month! So now what do I do? I hate the idea of being on benefits for the rest of my life, and I love my job and don’t think I could get anything as well paid and flexible anywhere else. But the idea of working two extra days a week for less money just seems crazy! What do I do? What have others done in this situation?