I am diagnosed with ADHD and somewhere on the higher funtioning autism scale, I have PTSD and reactive depression, for 21 years looking after the love of my life kept me focused and level.
All that changed when she died, I came very close to ending it all, I even completed my bucket list and the last item was going to be watching Marvel’s Endgame.
I have been on benefits for 21 years, when Paola was diagnosed I became her primary carer, My GP put me on incapacity benefit due to my depression and autism and the government gave me a little money to do the job of 3 nurses.
After Paola died our house income dropped from £1500 to £566, 7 days after the death I was diagnosed with Bowel Cancer (40% of my colon was removed over christmas) I could very easily stay on benefits, no one will force me off them (currently on ESA) but I don’t want to be on benefits till the day I die.
I can’t leave the house because of my problems but what I can do is stream and do videos for 14 hours a day, it helps me cope with all my problems, it gives me self worth, I do cooking videos, I talk about illness, none of it is high quality but people seem to enjoy it and that matters, if I can inspire someone to spend time with family or loved ones then that is a win.
So I want to make this my career and the goal being to reach the sum of £900 per month, enough to live on (I don’t have a car, house is paid for, I don’t smoke, drink or eat out) and put a little aside.
Money from my streams and youtube videos (I am now a Twitch affiliate) Advertising will grow as my channel grows but I don’t plan on counting it as a steady income.
Selling Paola’s art, she would have loved her artwork to be spread around the world and I make £5 on each sale.
Twitch subscribers, if you have Twitch Prime (free with Amazon Prime) you can subscribe to my channel for free and they give me $2.50 per month.
https://www.twitch.tv/quebber
I have a patreon page with a single $2.50 tier per month.
https://www.patreon.com/edgeofmidnight
Remember if just 480 people subscribe to my Twitch channel or patreon then I can continue along this path.
This is not charity, I am actually inspiring and providing entertainment.
To put this all in context, my father died when I was 12, a car crash where he sacrificed his own life to save my Mum, this masked the identifying of my ADHD and autism, 21 years ago the diagnosis of my then girlfriends with terminal cancer, causing reactive depression, diagnosis of early onset dementia of my mum at 50, I helped looking after Paola and my mum, she is now in a really nice home in end stages of the dementia, death of my wife, grief compounded by depression and autism, 7 days later diagnosed with Bowel cancer, a stay in hospital and 40% of bowels removed, nodule in my lungs 6mm in size 2 monthly CT scans to keep an eye on it, PTSD started when I was in hospital, 7 weeks after Paola died, I began to relive her death, now I can’t sleep on a bed, it has to be on the floor.
I am broken in ways that nothing will ever fix, I can’t hardly leave the house without crumpling to the ground as images of them trying to bring Paola back after the cardiac arrests (I was in the room, I choose to be there and watch it happen).
But this, this I can do, I can do talks about Dialysis, PTSD, Dementia, ADHD and Cancer, I can inspire people and it is enough.