When Support Disappears Overnight
In 2023, I was assessed by a new support provider, Seco Support. A provider that actually understood me and could create something bespoke for me. For the first time in a long time, I felt hopeful.
Then just a few weeks later, my old support provider pulled out with less than 24 hours’ notice. Just like that, they left.
How are providers allowed to just walk away and leave someone without support? Why did no one, not social care, not the CQC, step in and question it?
To make things worse, a social worker I had met only briefly decided to cut my support hours from 24 to just 8 without involving me or any of the professionals who knew me. Not even the new provider, who had been meeting with me weekly.
Social Care decisions often fail to include lived experience, which can escalate to risk and crisis.
Overnight, I went from being supported around the clock to being left stranded.
Left Without Help, Surviving in Crisis
I couldn’t survive like that. Every day became about just getting through the next few hours. I had to rely on anyone I could. Moving around constantly, staying wherever I could. Some days, I didn’t even know where I’d be sleeping.
How is anyone expected to live like that?
Why was my voice, the one living it, ignored?
My mental health collapsed. I hit autistic burnout and was completely overwhelmed. With no backup in place, my mum had to step in full-time. The strain on both of us was enormous. The system that should have supported me had failed completely.
Hospital Wasn’t Safety
Six months later, I was admitted to hospital. I thought it would be a place of safety. I was wrong.
In the first few weeks, I was restrained, pinned to the floor, and injected with medication that left me drowsy and disconnected. One night, after being injected, everything went blank. I don’t even remember falling asleep.
How is being restrained supposed to help someone feel better?
The longer I stayed, the worse it got. Every day blurred into the next, endless waiting, no news, no freedom. Being trapped, with no control and being isolated, started to change me. I felt like I was losing parts of myself.
There were only two nurses who truly understood me. They saw me, listened, and fought social care for me. Without them, I don’t think I would have survived.
It makes me wonder, why did it take just two people to do what entire systems couldn’t?
Losing Myself in Chaos
The environment was chaotic and unpredictable. Patients screaming, noise, confusion, and fear. Constant sensory overload.
I remember sitting there, wondering will I ever get out, or is this just how I’d be surviving forever. How long can anyone stay in that kind of environment before they start to disappear inside it?
Fighting Back: Taking a Stand
After months of being trapped and unheard, the NHS finally stepped in. They challenged social care and took my case to the highest commissioners.
Finally after a year in hospital, my 24-hour support was reinstated. I was placed back with Seco Support, the provider I had originally chosen.
It felt like one long, painful cycle. The system ended up doing exactly what should have been done from the start, but only after putting me through a full year of crisis, burnout and hospitalisation.
Why did it have to get this bad before anyone listened?
Why does it always take a crisis for people to act?
Victory, Reflection and Advocacy
Even after everything, I refused to give up. I fought for myself, for my support, and for my freedom. In the end, I won.
I lost so much through it all, my freedom, my stability, and even parts of myself. Why does it take breaking people before anyone listens?
This isn’t just about me. It’s happening to so many autistic and neurodivergent people who are failed by systems, and stripped of their autonomy. If they can do this to me, as someone with a strong voice, then what’s happening to those who struggle to advocate for themselves?
Real change starts with listening, accountability and understanding.
Autism-Lens 
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