Mish Green

My disabled and chronically ill siblings - some more tips from a fellow crip. To quote Sorcha who I wrote with recently: we belong in the future. 💚 Pls also see pinned post for more. ***** Text across six purple paint-sploshed slides reads as follows: PIP* tip #2: a simple format for answering difficult questions *Personal Independence Payment - a UK disability benefit that's not tied to work or income The questions asked on the PIP form are not totally clear, and your answers need to give more info than the questions are asking for. Your answers need to explain what, why, how and when. For every question. You can use this template for each question: "I can't do/need help to do (activity) due to the [specific symptoms/impairment] caused by my [condition, diagnosis, injury etc] which makes me [consequence]. This happens [timeframe] What. Why. How. When. They are less likely to recognise your disability if you don't explain each of these four elements. So for example: "I can't prepare a meal every day on the cooker because [the debilitating exhaustion and brain fog] caused by my [ME/CFS] makes me [fumble the knife and cut myself, and burn food on the cooker.] I am able to safely cook a meal [once per week]." The timeframe is really important to mention if your condition causes cumulative consequences, like increased dizziness, pain spikes, post-exertional malaise etc., as this is what helps to illustrate the additional impact and the recovery you must do afterwards. This is CRUCIAL for making invisible disabilities visible. Please see my other pinned post on PIP tips. Pace yourself. Do it in stages. Get help to do it. And do something life affirming along the way. You matter, we matter, our lives are important. We are so much bigger than their bureaucracy. #pip #personalindependencepayment #disabilityjustice #disabilitybenefits #piptips

Fellow UK chronically ill and disabled folk: you’ve probably read that the government is thinking of drastically cutting off Personal Independence Payments (PIP), the only disability support benefit available to everyone regardless of whether you’re in paid work or not. We keep reading about how they want to ‘motivate people with Long Covid and mental illness to get back to work’, as if plunging people into poverty will magically inspire their disability and debilitating illness away. (also lots of PIP recipients are in paid work already, so...) Ableist magical thinking is popular and everywhere. It’s stressful as all hell for us right now. So. This not being my first rodeo, I want to pass on a couple of tips that might help you plan your PIP application, review or appeal, or help you assist someone else with this. These are not tips on how to ‘work the system’ (please remind anyone who says this that disability benefit fraud stands at 0% according to the government’s own statistics as of 2024 – more here: /news/social-justice/dwp-disability-benefit-fraud-pip/) These are summarised pointers from the government’s own advice and criteria. I’ve just focused on a couple of really critical points with the intention to translate and define some of the fuzzy wording. I’m not an expert, but below I link to organisations who are, if you want to know more. Here it is, with the attached slides just summarising this longer explanation: 1. Your application will be judged on whether or not you can RELIABLY carry out certain activities that are detailed in the application form. The guidance notes don’t always make it clear what they mean by ‘reliably’, and how exactly that is measured, so I made you some slides. RELIABILITY means being able to do the activity to a reasonable standard, measured in three ways: • SAFELY in a manner unlikely to harm you or others • REPEATEDLY – as often as is required, not just once in a while • in a REASONABLE TIME PERIOD – no more than twice as long as a non-disabled person of your age would need to complete the activity 🧵... (more detail in comments) #PIP #disabilitybenefits #disabilitybenefitshelp

Reading Anne Boyer's 'The Undying' and thinking about cancer, me/CFS, invisible illness, and the magical thinking that attends. #cancerwriting #mecfs #millionsmissing #invisibleillness #theundying #disabilitywriting #disabledwriter #toxicpositivity

First poem in oh about a year or so: instead of words I have stitches / sewn carefully into an empty mouth, / thread for language coming and going / visible/invisible and my skin after / this long filamental year still / teaching me how to mend, fingertips / across a row of flossed backstitch - / feel how it leaves, returns, beckons / while the weft sings stay stay stay ************************* #crippoetry #writingmywayout #fibreart #surgicalpoetry #firstdraft #hospitalpoetry #cancerwriting

Reflective selfie at @thechristienhs - a warm welcome at the start of a long day #lgbtqia #lgbtqia🏳️‍🌈 #visibilitymatters #nhsforall #disabilityjustice #cancercare

⛑️ Open call for writing submissions: 50 - 1200 words to be crafted into a zine in the shape of a first aid kit ⛑️ Deadline for submissions (even if incomplete): JUNE 13th 2025 If you want a creative dare emailed to you every three months or so, pls subscribe to my newsletter at link in biog. All submission info is there in my most recent post. I promise I will not spam. I don't even like spam. #skearzines #zines #artistsbooks #firstaidart #firstaidwriting #smallpresspublishing #indiepublishing #disabilityjustice #queerwriters #globalmajoritywriters #cripart #communitycare #submissioncall

Manchester stall, terf island #therighttopee #transrightsarehumanrights #transliberationnow #weareeverywhere

I made these stickers - trying to find direction for my rage - and the print shop sent me an extra sheet 💙🤍💗 And look: there's one missing. I'm hoping it's up in their bathroom at work. #transrightsarehumanrights #transliberationnow #stickershop #therighttopee #supremecourtuk

💌 SKEAR ZINES CALL OUT 2025! 💌 📌 closes 13th June 2025 📌 We took a break last year, and this year all I can think about are first aid kits, those small packets of preperation for the injuries that come from this world. We want to see what kinds of first aid kit can be made from words and paper. What kinds of care for self and community and planet can exist in that space. We also want to see what different physical forms a zine can take, and I'm so excited about what we've decided on! This year, we will publish one 'traditional' folded paper zine, one zine in a matchbox (very useful tool for light, warmth, cooked food), and one zine that is a postcard (another very useful tool, this time for connection unmediated by the digital gated realm). ** please read more detail on what we're looking for, as well as the submission guidelines at the link in my biog ** Closing date for submissions is 13th June 2025, so get yourself thinking on care, and first aid, and come meet us for adventure! 🌿🌿🌿🌿🌿 #skearzines #indiepublishing #smallpress #poetryzine #artistbooks #firstaid #carewriting #matchboxpoetry #postcardpoetry #climatejustice #climatewriting #experimentalwriting #placewriting #creativenonfiction #zinemaking #queerwriters #queerwritersofcolour #globalmajoritywriters #disabledwriters #cripwriters #lgbtqwriters #olderwriters #crones

My trans siblings, we are and always have been part of nature, part of the vast biodiversity of our home planet, part of the billions of intricately expressive forms of life that that make this place the gorgeous ecology that it is. Don't ever let them convince you otherwise. Our place is everywhere. I made this sign for the first of many demos to come in the wake of the UK Supreme Court ruling that women are defined exclusively by the appearance of their external genitalia at birth; so, vagina = woman, which puts this ideology in line with misogynists - an irony that seems lost on the 'gender criticals'. #natureistrans #transrightsarehumanrights #lgbwiththet #lgbtqia #standupfightback #supremecourtuk #uksupremecourt

#transrightsarehumanrights #lgbtqia #lgbwiththet #bigotryisbullshit #wewillnotbesilent #supremecourtuk #uksupremecourt

FINAL TIX now for Street dreams: Urban Struggle Disability Pride 💥 Join disabled artists and their collaborators from Java & Bali - Indonesia, Cardiff and Liverpool to talk about mark making in the places that disempower us and the value of mural and street art as hyper-local radical activism. Artists contributing include: Butong, Nano and Rani from our partner organisation Jogja Disability Arts, Paul Curtis, Street Artist from the UK, Paula Souza Lopez and Andrew Boulton from Community Murals CIC. The session will be interpreted simultaneously from English to Bahasa and vice versa. BSL also available during the event. Book your FREE place now at the link in @dadafest bio. #dadafest #disabledarts #cripcreative #bahasa #disabilitypride #streetart