A disabled writer has complained that his NDIS funding won’t allow him to buy a dishwasher or tumble dryer, but will send a support worker to help him clean dishes and do laundry.
Sebastian West, who goes by ‘Fern’ or ‘Lars’ on social media, uses ‘they/him’ pronouns and describes himself as ‘disabled and mentally ill,’ shared a three-minute rant about his funding of the NDIS in April.
“The NDIS is very happy to pay hundreds, four, five hundred, six hundred dollars a week for you to have a support worker come and help you do the dishes, do the laundry and shit.” West told his 40,000 TikTok followers.
“But they won’t finance a dryer or a dishwasher, which is cheaper in the long run and also promotes the participant’s independence because they don’t have to rely on support workers to come to their home and help them wash the dishes. They just have to a dishwasher they can stack themselves.’
The 26-year-old, who lives in a three-bedroom house in Albion, in Melbourne’s west, said a dishwasher and tumble dryer would allow him to be more independent and would be cheaper for the NDIS in the long run.
Sebastian West (pictured), who goes by ‘Fern’ or ‘Lars’ on social media, uses ‘they/him’ pronouns and describes himself as ‘disabled and mentally ill’, shared a complaint from three minutes about your NDIS funding in April
The 26-year-old, who lives in a three-bedroom house in Albion, in Melbourne’s west, said a dishwasher and tumble dryer would allow him to be more independent and would be cheaper for the NDIS in the long run.
“If rich people with money can buy a tumble dryer to make things easier for them, I should be able to buy a tumble dryer with my NDIS funding because I’m disabled,” he added.
“I shouldn’t have support workers coming to my house multiple times a week, just to help me with the basic things I could buy an appliance for.”
The video, which has received more than 84,000 views, left many viewers confused as to why West needed the help of a support worker when he could stack a dishwasher and load a washing machine independently.
“I’m confused,” one wrote.
‘How is washing dishes more challenging than stacking a dishwasher?’
Another person asked what the problem was with simply washing dishes by hand.
“It’s multifaceted,” Mr. West responded.
“I struggle to keep it under control due to my mental health and I have finger joint problems and wet surfaces and heavy objects mean I drop them frequently.”
West, who in another comment said he was “literally so grateful” for the NDIS, appeared to suggest he had bought a dishwasher and dryer with his own money.
“My NDIS didn’t pay for my dryer or my dishwasher, but those are the two appliances in my house that make me independent,” she said in the video.
‘If I didn’t have a dishwasher I couldn’t wash the dishes. “If I didn’t have a dryer, I wouldn’t have clean clothes.”
One commenter, who claimed to be a support worker, suggested a way around the problem.
West describes himself as “autigender,” which is defined online as an identity in which someone feels their gender is connected to their autism.
“Put in your plan goals that you want to learn to do laundry independently and then you can avoid it,” they said.
The NDIS pointed Daily Mail Australia to a section on its website titled “household items”.
“We do not normally fund common household items such as a dishwasher or washing machine as they are not likely to meet our grant funding criteria,” he said. state.
The NDIS said this was because this was not disability-related support and it was “reasonable to expect you to fund the cost of common household items in the home”.
West describes himself as “autigender,” which is defined online as an identity in which someone feels their gender is connected to their autism.
“It’s not that autism is a gender, it’s that your autism affects the way you perceive gender and your gender identity, to the point where you feel like they can’t be separated,” West explained in a video last year.
‘Obviously I’m autistic. As a child, she was a tomboy, the category of girl meant nothing to me. I was like one of the boys.’
West has regularly documented his hospital treatment for mental health battles.
He also revealed in March this year that he had been diagnosed with Ehlers Danlos syndrome, a group of rare inherited diseases that affect connective tissue.
“Right now I have my cane, I’m still waiting for the NDIS to make my wheelchair for me,” he wrote on social media.
“I’ve been trying to get one since 2021.”
In 2021, West raised nearly $3,000 on a GoFundMe page to help him access psychiatric inpatient care after he was allegedly “outed” by a YouTuber.
“He claimed I was pretending to be trans, pretending to be autistic, pretending to be disabled, he confuses me, he makes fun of me, he makes fun of my appearance, my weight, my transition, my body,” West wrote.
“I tried my best to pretend it didn’t affect me (sic), but in August 2019 I tried to take my life because of it.”
Daily Mail Australia has approached Mr West for comment.