Chronically-ill 37-year-old lands first ever job, thanks to ground-breaking UK charity

Andy

Andy

Retired committee member
Victoria Clutton calls for employment barriers to be removed for the long-term ill, as ASTRiiD (Available Skills for Training, Refreshing, Improvement, Innovation and Development) marks its first year of success.

Opportunity, purpose and income have been afforded to determined Victoria Clutton for the first time in her life, after innovative UK charity ASTRiiD connected her skills to meaningful work – something that was always beyond her reach.

The 37-year-old, from Lincoln has battled the debilitating symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS)/ME since the age of 16, making the past two decades of job hunting an impossible task.
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http://ablemagazine.co.uk/chronical...ver-job-thanks-to-ground-breaking-uk-charity/
 
I have been trying to develop my programming skills with an eye towards some form of work that can be done from home, but it's very hard to get anything meaningful done. This is an impressive achievement of hers.
 
Very interesting. 8 hours a week sounds feasible. I couldn’t manage 15. Presumably she is still on benefits as the hourly rate would have to be fantastic to be able to live off 8 hours work.

The biggest challenge is in carving out a role that can be achieved in that working pattern, and in finding ways of working with others in the organisation. The role I was given to do in 15 hours possibly could have been done in 30 and was on a project that had tight timescales and a big group of stakeholders i had to engage with through telephone meetings. Ideal role would be to be largely working on your own or with a small group of contacts, not have too many meetings. Everyone good at keeping records of progress and actions so you don’t have to waste time phoning people to find out what went on at meetings when you weren’t working. Oh and no business critical deadlines.
 
I have done some translation work through Gengo, mostly 5-10 minutes worth at a time but occasionally bigger projects that have taken me days.

It works really well during periods with less brain fog, and for a while I had a perfect score at all times, but then I tried to do some this fall with a brain that barely functioned and wrecked my score bad enough that I will need to take the qualifying test again to take on more work.

But super flexible, no commitment, and actually decent money for the time spent (at least when you’re already in bed on the computer all day anyway)!

ETA: You need to speak at least two languages fluently of course. However there are lots of sites for proofreading, virtual assistants and more, if you can spare the brain power. Too much for
me, but the fog is pretty heavy these days.
 
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