William Stanley

I never thought I would have to write this, but I have reached a point where fighting quietly is no longer an option. For the last year and a half, I have been fighting a war just to stay alive, trapped in a bureaucratic nightmare that is failing our most vulnerable. I live with a highly complex, interconnected presentation of anorexia, bulimia, complex PTSD, BPD, depression, and severe anxiety. I am also autistic. Growing up, I was the neurodivergent kid who was just "normal" enough to slip by unnoticed—until I fell through the cracks entirely. Because my conditions are incredibly intertwined, the current healthcare and welfare systems don't know what to do with me. Instead of treating the whole person, the system looks at my illnesses in isolated "boxes." Because of this technicality, I have been denied the Disability Support Pension (DSP) and left languishing on JobSeeker for over 1.5 years. The financial and physical reality of this is terrifying. The basic allowance I receive falls $700 to $900 short every single month of what I need just to afford the complex dietary requirements to keep my body functioning—and that is before even factoring in the cost of psychological treatment. The public hospital waitlists are years long, and driven by KPIs rather than actual patient care. I have been left so medically and financially abandoned that, for weeks at a time, I have survived on nothing but skim milk powder. My inability to eat solids forced me to develop my own liquid supplement drink just to stabilize my failing body, because the public safety net completely gave way. I am done being silent about this administrative violence. I am fighting to survive so that I can eventually fight to change this broken system, but right now, I just need to live. What the funds will be used for: I am raising money to cover my immediate, basic survival. 100% of these funds will go toward: Covering the $700-$900 monthly gap for my specialized dietary and nutritional needs. Accessing the private, specialized psychological and psychiatric treatment that the public system has denied me. Keeping a roof over my head while I continue the exhausting fight to be approved for the DSP. If you cannot donate, please, please share this. People need to know what happens in the blind spots of our healthcare system. Thank you for reading, for sharing, and for helping me stay in the fight.