@star-anise / @beyondthisdarkhouse / @with-my-murder-flute / @thehaberdasheress here:
I think now I can express where I'm at, because I've managed to wrestle down my gibbering terror today.
Here in Alberta, Canada, the United Conservative Party government is very clearly trying to slash the social support network to ribbons. They are making changes and cutting funding all over the place, but especially for Albertans who are unhoused, low-income, disabled, or mentally ill.
When I got onto AISH (Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped) it felt like a miracle. I got $1800 a month, every month! I could pay rent AND bills AND one good grocery trip a month! (Median rent here is about $1000 a month for a bachelor or 1 bedroom apartment)
I used to have a dream job. I wanted to be a psychologist since I was like 14. I did years of university and job experience until I was employed to do the work daily. And every fucking time, my body gave out on me. I have fibromyalgia, one of those "chronic pain and fatigue because??? womanly hysteria???" diseases. It's hard for me to work even a fraction of full time. After a 3-hour workday, on a 10-hour week, I shambled home and collapsed straight into bed. I spent 10 years getting a job, doing it for a few months, and needing to leave because my health just got too bad. I never earned more than $17k a year.
Now the province has announced that it's completely splitting up AISH, creating a new category called ADAPT. It's for disabled people who are technically employable, and will make us perform "simulated work" to become employable. They're being coy about the details, but everyone I've talked to with a disability or even family with disability advocacy has agreed, it's pretty clear they're not doing this to increase our benefits.
I am stupid scared. This is as factually as I am able to put it. My processing capacity for politics is extremely low right now. I am not as badly off as a lot of people in a lot of other countries, but right now I am existentially terrified for myself and the disabled people I love. And all the ones I don't personally love, frankly. When I let myself feel the terror and grief and rage, it only keeps expanding.
This new program will take effect in June 2026 and although I will spend the next year and a half fighting as much as I am able, part of me is convinced that we will lose the way we seem to have lost every single fucking fight in this province since 2018. The UCP quite literally look up to US Republicans as role models and mentors. (Did you know Ted Cruz was born in Calgary, AB? His parents came up to work in our oil industry.)
So I just wanted to say: Yes, I am deliberately avoiding political commentary as much as possible. Yes, I haven't had much capacity to help anyone else out, and I'm sorry. I'm mostly trying to just keep myself and my business from falling apart completely, because it seems clear that I have to budget my last few remaining shreds of sanity very carefully indeed.
If possible, please send cat pics.
-Lis
