welcome Caroline ,
the year issue you are on about boils down to this:

If you have been working and paying National Insurance for a set period of time prior to claiming ESA then you will qualify for ESA (contribution based) .. this means that income of a partner/husband/wife and savings/second properties etc are not taken into account .
However this is time limited to 365 days .
Time while you are in the support group does not count towards the 365 days.
If you are in the Work related Group then 365 days is the maximum you can claim ESA contribution based.

After the 365 days you will have to claim ESA (Income related )... this means that your savings /partners income /ISA's /second properties are taken into account.
see Disability ESA Factsheet

With regard to DLA , GP's and Consultants are required to supply the DWP with a statement of facts if asked.( ESA they are not required).. bear in mind they do not know who your GP is or your Consultant unless you have put them on the form.
It maybe of help for you to gather your own evidence ..in the form of a diary /contacting your GP/Occ Therapy/physio/ Consultant to support your claim.

I cannot recommend enough a visit to an advice agency at this point.
if your decisision is unfavourable ... consider appealing and look at this factsheet

Good luck and get back here if any issue ..though face to face advise is really the way to go ( in other words if you are on ESA (income based) now ..you should qualify for legal aid.
Check this out at Legal Aid


Hope this helps

Rich C :)

Thank you so much for the advice Rich.