A concept - see form filling linguistically and translate your needs from 'Claimantspeak' into 'Assessorspeak'.
If I limp, for me it's a sign of strength and adaptation, using the bits of me that work to compensate for the bits that don't. For an assessor, what matters is if limping is a sign of weakness, if bits of me don't work properly.
An example of a 'Do not'.
Personally I have a bad habit I urge others not to copy. When filling in forms for myself, I panic and defensively go into absurd detail, nitpicking, hair-splitting, technical terminology etc. to the point of panic-stricken counter-productiveness. Don't, don't, don't!!! E.g. assessor thought 'attentional memory problems' meant 'dementia' and asked my GP if I had dementia or 'mild cognitive impairment', i.e. euphemism for early dementia. Which brings me to my second point...
An example of a 'Do'. An example of 'translation' that has worked for me in a range of form-filling contexts when I use it, which I always have when filling in forms for others. (I have raised seven figures in funding from grants this way.)
I looked in despair at some grant forms. I wanted funding for providing help for people in an inner city area. I needed to prove that the demographics of the people our charity helped mapped onto local demographics. But the official statistical boundaries were based around ward & constituency & city boundaries, not around our catchment area, which overlapped statistical areas. Well, we just accepted anyone that wanted & needed our help. Stuff what colour, religion, nationality, social class or whatever they were. If they needed extra help to use our services, we fixed it up for them. But the people assessing applications didn't know that.
Hmm, what to do? I got it. Don't divide by 'ethnicity' or 'nationality' or 'religion'. Divide by generations of immigration. This generation, parents, or unknown/further back. Bingo, it mapped on to the official statistics. If that hadn't worked, I could have tried other methods.
So I didn't misrepresent anything, I found more appropriate way to represent the key information truthfully. They wanted to know whether we provided services to the local people that needed them without prejudice or exclusion so I found a way to say yes, we did.
To summarise
'Translate' your 'independence needs' from Claimantspeak into Assessorspeak. Not how you describe them, how they describe them. Not how you conceptualise them, how they conceptualise them. Not what you think should gain you points, what they think should gain you points.
You and other regular posters will know me well enough for me not to need to say this to you, but to be clear for any lurkers - I am not saying misrepresent your needs or lie about them.
