To think this woman is using stress leave for chilling out?

[Skylight23]

Not a friend, I know her quite well because her DS and mine have been friends for a long time. She is a doctor with NHS and her DH has a city job.
She has been on and off on stress leave for a few weeks. Her younger DS is doing 11plus this year and her brother’s family is visiting them for 2weeks (from USA). She told me the other day that she is struggling to manage everything and she might go to the GP and cry to get some time off. She has been shopping, spending time with her brother’s family. Also hot housing the younger one with tutors. She can’t take him to this particular tutor if she works (tuition 4pm to 6pm). So much for being stressed! She isn’t stressed. She just has soo many other things that she wants to do, that work is coming in the way! I won’t be surprised if she gets stressed again in August (school holidays, summer days on the beach, 11plus, childcare costs). She always hated the fact that she has to work (in debt to eyeballs). She gets really pissed about her DH not making enough for the lifestyle they want. Makes jealous comments about SAHMs at school.

AIBU to want to report her? I must admit I’m jealous. I too wanted time off when DS was doing 11plus, I too wanted paid time off when my family visited (without having to use my holiday entitlement), I too want time to generally chill out. But my conscience won’t permit this “crying at the GP” thing.

Health professionals burn out

There is no denying that if a person wants to, they can play the system.
However, what this woman does is her business genuine or not.

My advice would've for you to manage your own stress OP. You sound irrationally angry about someone you are not even friends with. You are projecting your own frustrations. Concentrate on yourself.

This phone is driving me mad!
Too many autocorrects.

I repeat health professionals burn out

Wheely Did you just repeat for me?!

OP you are an odious individual - I was one of the cases Unite was supporting years ago to see if an employer was liable for causing mental health problems at work in an employment tribunal. Due to the actions my then employer took against me my case couldn't be used. However the upside of all the cases it is my friends' and acquaintances who were ended up in similar situations a couple of years afterwards has their stress cases taken seriously by their employers. Some then were put on sick leave for stress with doctors notes for anything up to 6 months. They did all sorts of jobs from social work to accountancy to marketing.

Being on this kind of sick leave means you are allowed and actually encouraged to do normal family and leisure things you are just not allowed to work. In some cases like mine you are encouraged to seek a different employer, in others you are encouraged to change specialism and in others to change your job completely.

Oh and I have family members who work for the NHS doing a variety of things. One has a colleague was unable to get child care she could afford for her two children under 10 in the summer holidays last year so was off unpaid for 3 weeks. The main problem was that her husband, who was suppose to do half the childcare, had to leave the country suddenly to deal with a dying parent. So if you can't afford childcare you can take unpaid leave as per the law.

Is stress leave an NHS term? At my work it's an absence and stress is the reason, it's counted just like any other absence such as flu, broken leg etc.

People need to be really careful getting signed off with stress if it's not genuine, that follows you around, you have to declare on holiday insurance, life insurance, mortgage applications. If it's not genuine, I really wouldn't fake it to get some time off for a kids 11 Plus.

You’ve have no idea exactly how stressed she really is, I suspect she is playing it down and making it seem like a joke but this is how a lot of people cope. It would be very spiteful for you to report her, it’s not effecting your life. I suggest you find better things to do with your time.

I’m really sorry you went through this. I know people here are pouncing on me because I may have pricked the ones with genuine reasons unintentionally.

To be clear, I’m NOT saying people with genuine reasons should not take time off or anything. But, people who use the system to fund lifestyle choices !
This woman actually boasts of knowing what to say to the GP to get signed off. Last year they went on a Europe road trip with 2 very young kids. Obviously long hours riding in the car etc - kids got very cranky and they had to cut the trip short and come back. They spent the rest of the holiday at home. She was mighty pissed. When she returned to work the following week, she decided she is too stressed from the holiday and took 2 weeks off for stress after that!

This time, it’s new levels. Stress leave for planned events !

Personally booking a gp appt to discuss fake stress isn't fair and I do understand the original poster point of view.

Would i report it, no but I would feel an injustice. What about the doctor's colleagues who will be also under pressure? they will pick up all duties and responsibilities whilst the person off is likely to receive 3-6 months full pay. What impact would it have in nhs services, operations cancelled? Appts delayed?

I would be very disheartened by any of my colleagues casually discussing so flippantly going off with stress. Good mental health is important and to abuse it and take it is morally deplorable

Hilarious!! Now the commuter belt mummies are even competing over who has timed their mental illness best to advantage their child in the 11plus!

OP, whatever the morality of your or your friend’s actions, I think you’ve misunderstood what whistleblowing is.

Her employer has an absence policy; they have to follow it. As she hits various trigger points, she will proceed through the system and ultimately will have to improve her attendance or face being managed out. They can’t act more quickly or sack her immediately because someone rings up claiming to be her friend wittering on about the 11+. I think they’d find themselves facing costly legal action if they did!

It’s up to the employer to implement an absence policy that supports ill employees and weeds out skivers. It’s not up to you. And many people have poured out the stigma and judgement that attends mental health problems and how attitudes like your OP just fuel that and make a difficult situation considerably worse.

When a health professional is burned out....when their head can't concentrate..

Like a computer that is running very slow because it's running a big program in the background...health professionals can be distracted when they have so much going on

That's when mistakes happen

Do you want a GP making mistakes OP??????????

Fake not take!

You sound vile OP

It's none of your business. You have no idea what is happening in her house.

She is a doctor so she knows what to say to get signed off?! What the actual fuck? By your reasoning, she should never get sick, never suffer any mental health problems. Because she is a doctor. Oh do fuck off.

I'm married with two kids. My husband earns a decent six figure salary. We go on vacations, have fancy cars and I'm a SAHM, because he earns enough. So I should be happy?

No. He's had two ONS which we are fucking trying to recover from. I spend my days in depression and some days can fucking not get the energy to do anything. Yet, no one knows. So I plaster a Happy face on and go about my day. And it looks like I spend my days at the gym, out with friends and keeping the kids busy. Not everything is what you see

You have no idea what's going on. Keep your own issues to yourself. It has nothing to do with you. NOTHING.

ODFOD

Teacher here. Signed off for two months a couple of years ago when shitstorms in my working and personal lives made it all too much. I was scared to go out because I knew that people like you would be judging me. That made it worse.

Life is full of unfair. Surely most adults know that the world is so so far from perfect that all they are doing is trying to see chink of light here and take a moment of happiness there as we go along. Living in this world full of bad and wrong is all about leading a good life yourself and developing a thick skin and making your own life as full of sunshine and goodness as you can.
OP what this person is doing may well be yet another bit of bad and wrong among millions. Maybe you are lucky to only see this one bit. Maybe you are young and have yet to have the edges rubbed off in the jostle? Jokers, scammers, wide boys, triers, robbers, tossers are all out there in massive massive abundance. This woman may be yet another or she may genuinely have a situation on her hands. You need to just see her as part of the sludge grey background against which little outbreaks of happiness and light can occur if you have the eyes to see. Take these things to heart and you won't last a day.

Again though, how many GP's refuse to sign off with stress? Unless someone was an obvious blagger it would be very hard for a GP to assess a persons " limits" without lengthy psychological tests.

Mine didn't. A few years ago I was experiencing stress and depression. My GP felt that time off work would actually cause me greater problems in the long run (because of potential isolation / lack of distractions etc). She suggested other forms of treatment that were more suitable. She was right, and in time (with therapy and anti depressants) I got better. Sick notes certainly aren't handed out like sweets.

I'm not saying nobody ever plays up their symptoms and overstates the case to their GP. I'm saying mental illness is complex and that nobody - least of all a casual acquaintance with no medical training like OP - can determine whether someone is 'faking' or not. OP isn't basing her assessment on fact, but in her own self-confessed jealousy and prejudice. That's the real issue here.

Bluebug45 - taking unpaid leave is completely fair. What I don’t understand is why should NHS (or the tax payer) pay for people to recover from stress due to lifestyle choices and people who know to play the system?

'Am I being unreasonable'
'Yes'

'No I'm not'.

If you're not that close you have no idea what's going on really. She's entitled to stress leave. As are you by the sounds of it? Take time off if you need it, as anyone else does.

You sound overly invested in this. Why does it bother you so much? You don't know how stress affects her, if she has panic attacks or physical symptoms or a condition that flares up under stress. You keep comparing her to yourself, but unless you're both NHS doctors in the same dept you have no idea what stress and strain she's under at work.

NHS managers are fully aware staff often take sick leave for stress when they need a break. It helps prevent breakdowns and burnout.

I think you should phone her DC's grammar school OP, and file a formal complaint that she cheated by being mentally ill during the run up to the 11plus which meant she could do more runs to the tutor's house. See if you can get the child's place overturned. That's what she deserves right?

I don’t think you really know how debilitating sustained stress / anxiety is when it is precipitating a breakdown, or you have had a breakdown.
Just imaging that it is like I a stressful event x 12, is not really getting it. When you have it it is incredibly hard to function in a normal way, be that working as a doctor, or punching numbers on a spreadsheet.

Part of the recovery is to try and relax through leisure activities, or whatever else helps. Sitting alone at home in a darkened room is only helpful to people like you, that lack compassion and need a visual representation of the misery of a invisible illness.

In addition, the NHS, like all public sector organisations strictly monitor sickness levels. Leaving yourself with no holidays and then using sick leave, would be very easily picked up on.

Hard to believe someone is that spiteful that they'd try to get someone in trouble because they don't think they're stressed enough for stress leave. Do you have any idea how stressful a Drs life is? Or what goes on in her house or what problems she might have that she doesn't want a judgemental and mean spirited person to know about?

Mind your own business, her health is for her and her doctor to deal with, not for you to sit in judgment on.

Pure nastiness.