DLA for a child with no support from school?

[whatthehelltodo]

Hi there i hope im posting in the right place !My 9 yo daughter has quite a few medical issues , one being dyspraxia , hypermobility and sensory processing issues , she is also being screened for ASD ( aspergers being the key thing)she is extremely bright ( often aspergers girls are !) and can comply in school ( again aspergers girls can ) ! Although she does receive some support with her workAt home is a different story its far too much to put in a post but she is disruptive, aggressive , has no memory or organisation is extremely accident prone and doesnt sleep . fiddles to thing suntil her bedroom is in bits up and down till 2 am for toilet/drinks / headaches / sickness etc obviously i could go on and on here !As a family we are not coping very well if im honest !My problem is school dont see this and there for are not supportive with screening etc ( they already stopped the adhd screen !) so anyway speaking to cab they advised me to claim DLA i talked in depth to a lady to helped fill in the forms she said she would assume we would get high rate care due to my daughters complex needs !My only issues obviously are school not agreeing and a ? with occupational therapy as all tasks with them were done 121 so my DD could concentrate in that situation .. i know of a lot of people refused on the basis of a school report ?does anyone have an knowledge of this ?I know appealing is an option im not sure i will because im emotionally exhausted from it all .My claim is with the decison maker as a type , id love t buy my daughter a luxury mattress to maybe help her sleep .thank you to anyone who may reply x

[jadeybags]

Well, my son is hearing impaired, bi lateral sensory neural high frequency hearing loss, wears hearing aids, he has never been statemented & only has a visit once a week from a Tass teacher at school, she used to come to our home from when he was 1 & a half. But we still claimed DLA for him until he was 11, then it stopped.

Unless things have changed, which is possible, the school dont need to give any input? If any health professional can help you with the forms that would be good. My sons TASS teacher did all the leg work for us when he was about 2.

It's weird reading your post because my daughter is a lot like some of the 'symptoms' you have described there, memory is baaaad, very much a loner though, struggles to form friendships, total lack of confidence, I went up the school last week for a meeting & they have agreed to confidence counselling. The only thing is, she struggles with work in class. Accident prone, bad sleeper, frequent headaches, had those checked out years ago & 2 docs said nothing to worry about.

I have asked her to go to the docs recently but she wont. She is 14.

Kids ey, they are such a worry.

[Nystagmite]

I think you need to talk to the school. I heard of a case not so long ago, where a child was denied DLA. He attends a school for children with special needs and the school had just applied for him to have more 1 to 1 help. Despite those facts, school said he was "fine".

[terriersaregreat]

Hi, it sounds as if you should have claimed DLA and Carers allowance for your daughter a long time ago.

 

If you have medical diagnosis for these conditions it will be GP/specialist that will provide the information to DWP so discuss your probs with them and tell them you want to claim DLA. Even request a letter from them in support of your claim and send it.

 

Have a grand daughter in receipt of DLA, different reasons than yours. Medical evidence, any help groups that you belong to will all help to support your claim. Need to get on to middle rate for carers.

 

However be prepared to appeal, not such a bad thing, lots of help if necessary on here.

[leemack]

DLA is dependant on the care your child needs day or night, and any supervision or mobility needs outdoors.

 

The difficulty with the school not being supportive, is that you'll be saying that your daughter's behaviour is a certain way, and then the school will contradict you - the DWP will generally believe the school in the abscence of any other professional corroboration. I've seen this happen quite a few times, The DWP can't seem to get their head around the idea that behaviour can be different in different settings and times of day, and so the claim may fail.

 

Unfortunately, getting a child assessed for autistic spectrum disorder, learning difficulties, ADHD, mental health issues etc can be almost impossible sometimes unless initiated and supported by the school.

 

Does your daughter see any specialists, psychologists etc?

[terriersaregreat]

I worked with children in various settings for over 40 years. Reading your post again I recalled a parent telling me of a similar situation with her son.

 

The mother was a teacher whose father had been a professor. she had another another son who was severly autistic. Therefore someone with a lot of education and child experience. I had care of her son for approximately an hour a day. It was evident to me that he was "different", extremely intelligent but could be "difficult" not fitting in with other children. However I felt that he was a "gifted" child and possibly more demanading for that reason.

 

One day met the mother outside school and she explained to me that her son had been diagnosed with Aspergers. I had no idea that she had been trying to get this assessment for some time. She told me that the school had refused to help in any way and that they felt she had been over-reacting! His behaviour then fitted what my experience of his behaviour was like in my care.

 

Was wondering if you belonged to any help groups or contacted any as could be that your situation is common to these wonderfully complicated children. Unless trained to spot these symptoms difficult for some qualified people to acknowledge. The mother above recognised that her son was displaying symptoms of the syndrome and did not give up getting the diagnosis so that her son would receive the help and understanding he needed.

[whatthehelltodo]

wow sorry i took to long finding 5 mins to get back on here thanks for such lovely replies !yes my daughter has been like this from birth ! I do feel some upset towards HCPS who kept telling me she would grow out of it !I totally respect DWP/DLA must ensure every claim is genuine . Unfortunately with many aspergers children / asd / dysprxic and hypersensitive children they can sometimes conform in school .I have witnessed my daughters awkwardness and social issues in school but school seem turned off to it ?We ar ein touch with CAMHS who ar etrying to do the assessments but school are not allowing us to go forward ? Also i have a local family support group i keep in touch with also ?I know school were asked for a report as was my gps and i suspect CAHMS were too ?i know peopel with a lot of support who get turned down purely on schools report

[terriersaregreat]

So sorry that you are experiencing so little help. my only advice is to keep going and appeal any decisions that are made.

[gatecrasher007]

I am very interested in this post primarily as I didnt know that girls could have Aspergers Syndrome, I was led to believe that only boys had this! I learnt this some 10 years go and was told then that only boys had this. You would need to get someone to help you fill in the DLA form someone like CAB who are used to this. I would also be interested to hear if you got it and if ADHD had any contribution towards the DLA award.

[Nystagmite]

DLA is based on care and /or mobility needs and nothing to do with diagnosis. With children, you need to prove that they:

- have care and /or mobility needs the same as a younger child, and /or:

- above and beyond that of a child of their own age

 

Girls can and do have Aspergers Syndrome. However, boys are more likely to have it.

[gatecrasher007]

That is very interesting, I was recently reading the book and I know its for kids but it won prizes, The Curious Incident of the dog in the Night time, I read it as my brother was diagnosed with AS some years back but he was in his late 60's! I had alot of emphathy for the book and funnily enough thought to myself could this be me? reactions etc, then I thought no girls dont get AS so very interesting.

[whatthehelltodo]

as a dyspraxic hypersensitive child my daughter has 24/7 needs and always has with little sense of danger , she only sleeps around 4 hours a night at best and has emotional meltdowns constantly i cant take her far from home or shopping like normal parents do as she cant handle it i cant write it all here i recently wrote it all down and created 18 pages ..lol! but yes she definitely needs more attention than my 1 and 4 year olds put together !

aspergers is ) they think ) as common in girls just severely under recognised and diagnosed . Girls who show the quirks that appears to be aspergers can appear normal such as obsessons with animals etc also socially girls peers are more likely to 'mother' and help other girl peers also girls are much more likely to try and copy peers to try to appear the same .

xxx thansk again xxxx

[leemack]

My partner was diagnosed with aspergers as an adult (in his 40's), so if you think you might have signs of it you can try to get assessed. Partner's assessment was via mental health services as anxiety and depression go hand in hand with it as an adult. They were really good, it involved an initial assessment, then referral to a psychologist who gave us tons of questions to answer and also a long questionnaire for his mum about how he was as a kid. In order to have aspergers you have to have had symptoms start in early childhood.

 

Most people have some asperger-like traits, but these can be caused by other things like personality disorders and other mental health conditions. And yes, girls can have it too, but my understanding is the presentation can be slightly different - but it depends how far up the spectrum they are.

 

But if you're worried. get assessed - its made a huge difference to our lives, understanding what the problem is makes it so much easier to deal with.

[whatthehelltodo]

ah well claim refused on school report and pead report ( pead never met my daughter btw !)

[terriersaregreat]

If you havn't seen the reports you have the right to see all reports. You have a right of appeal so use it.

 

You will then go before the appeal panel in person and they have a totally different attitude. You will also be able to put your points in person.

 

Try not to despair it appears to be very common for DLA to be refused initially. Hang on in there.

[matt5983]

Personally i have helped with over 20 DLA applications and each one i have got the right amount for the individual, my advise is never ask a school to do anything, there not medical professionals in any context and say what the child is like with them and what help the give,

[Nystagmite]

That makes no sense - DLA is based on care and /or mobility needs. Therefore, school would be aware of this to an extent. (IE, child may have 1:1 support)

[matt5983]

That makes no sense - DLA is based on care and /or mobility needs. Therefore, school would be aware of this to an extent. (IE, child may have 1:1 support)

unfortunatly your right, it does not make sense. However i done one claim where the child had aspergers, blind in one eye and deaf in both ears. The school put he was socially active and had lots of fun playing. 2 of the specalists who treat him went ballistic as he was turned down for DLA, but after i had appealed without the school's evidence, he was awarded what was right

[whatthehelltodo]

Hi again - i didnt ask them to ask schol they just do apparently which does make sense.Spoken with cab today an dthey are shellshocked we didnt get awarded.nystagmite if you google dyspraxic / SENSORY processing disorder / aspergers in girls you will see alot of girls can and do conform in teh school environment - once all that effort and concentration is used up all day it can have explosive resullts at home.Also as i stated in a previous post asperger girls appear normal as there obsessiveness mainly revolves around animals etc which in young girls appears 'normal'Also again as stated in a previous post school seen unaware of what we are dealing with - they refute any issues despite the fact my daughter has been doing some extra 121 work every week and a dvd aimed at learning dyspraxic children and again as stated in a previous post aspergers / DCD girls follow peeps more easily then boys ..........i now have a dilema that the DLA people never approached CAMHS ... camhs could tell in great details the problems we have so i approached cahms for a report as i can not believe dla people didnt ask them ?Camhs stated that dla people need to request a report - so i rang dla people who state they wont request further info as it is up to me to get that so i quieried why they didnt approach cahms ( but a pead who never met my child !) i was told the decision makers ask who they want i i have no right to request who they speak to ! kind of makes the filling out the 'who to contact' bit of the form that took 5 hour sto complete a bit of a joke !anyway ill stop ranting thansk fo rthe advice xx

[Nystagmite]

Unfortunately, they can pick and choose who they contact. I made a claim last year. They contacted no-one and decided that despite me stating that I need a lot of supervision due to sight loss and depression, they decided I don't need it. Yet, the bruises and scars on my knees from tripping over (I can and do trip over anything, including thin air) tell a different story.

 

They did in my most recent claim, contact my GP. He has no idea at all of the problems I have with my vision. I don't even think he's aware that I have another diagnosis and that I'm colour blind. He stated that he doesn't know what care needs I have. (because it's nothing I see my GP about - no-one can do anything about my pain issues, or my vision problems) They took this has "claimant has no care needs".

[whatthehelltodo]

it seems so unfair

[terriersaregreat]

Hi again. You have the right to appeal which I think is the best way forward. As I said previously having had experience of appealing it really is the best course of action.

 

You will receive all the info DLA relied upon and will now have benefit of hindsight to explain exactly what are the probs with your daughter. You will also be able to obtain any reports you wish to rely upon.

 

I'm very much afraid to say that apparently this is the norm today. It appears that first application are usually refused. You have nothing to lose by appealing. CAB may be able to help with this.

[Nystagmite]

Don#y ask for a reconsideration - this is done as part of the appeals process. I was told I couldn't appeal after having a reconsideration.

[terriersaregreat]

Sorry don't agree as far as I remember I asked for a reconsideration, which was done with the same annoying/upsetting answer and then appealed and was granted DLA by the tribunal.

[leemack]

Don#y ask for a reconsideration - this is done as part of the appeals process. I was told I couldn't appeal after having a reconsideration.

 

You can appeal after a reconsideration - you were told wrong. But yes, a reconsideration is done as part of an appeal.