AIBU to take some time off work for mums illness

[mumontherun14]

Hi there. Just looking for some opinions on this. I work full time in a government role managing a small team. My dear mum has Alzhiemers and is now at an advanced stage. She has had it for past ten years and has been gradually getting worse. Last year she fell at home and hurt her head and needed 24hr care and had to move into a care home. It is a really nice place and the staff are lovely.

I work full time but with flexible working and usually manage to work from home at least 2 days a week. I visit Mum twice a week in afternoons but recently have felt she is really sleepy can be less responsive and now doesn't recognise me which has been really hard to deal with though there can be good & bad days. She is well visited and has either my dad, my uncle, myself or my sister there every day so she always has a visitor.

I have 2 brothers but both live abroad so no regular help & my sister has a toddler so she is also stretched. At night both my teens have sports hobbies so we spend a lot of time dropping them off and picking up and we try and get help and get lifts as much as we can but by time I get dinner homework etc sorted it's a bit late to go to the home and she is usually asleep quite early. The best time to catch her awake is in the mornings. Would it be unreasonable to take a few weeks off work & get a sick line just to go and sit with her in the mornings. She is not desperately ill or at end stage or anything but I just feel sometimes that I should be there more and have more quality time with her rather than a quick visit twice a week. We are coming up to the end of financial year at work where there is a big workload for our team and I already have 1 lady off long term sick but she is about to come back so its not really an ideal time for me to go off but I don't want to look back and regret that I spent this time at work when Mum was still semi aware and able to enjoy music & being read to. I was/am very close to my mum and have been really devastated by her illness. Last year she fell in the house and I took a month off while she was in hospital and moved to the home but thats the only time I have had off. I am lucky we have very supportive policies and I could get up to 6 months off full pay. I don't want to use this full amount but I am thinking a month or so could be ok as would need to keep some time in case she really was seriously ill later on. I know the doctor would give me a line for family stress that's what I had the last time and I am on medication for stress/anxiety. Its just all such a juggling act at times and I never feel that I am doing that great a job for Mum or the kids or my elderly dad who my sister and I also look after.

My DH is great he is here and helps with everything but he can often work away and this week its Mums birthday and I need to work then next week DH is away for work and think its just tipped me over the edge. I can't reduce my hours at the moment as we are only allowed one change in 12 months and I increased back to full time last June when Mum went into the home to aid our own finances which are always stretched but that could be something I could look at in June again. Before I worked 4 days and took Mum to a music group on my day off. AIBU to go off sick with stress? xxx

I’m really sorry about your mum and Alzheimer’s is an awful illness. I’m not sure a doctor would sign you off in all honestly. However, I do appreciate that morning visits are generally best for those with dementia so could you change your working hours or perhaps build up hours so you can have a few mornings off to go and visit then? I’m assuming as you are able to wfh that you could easily work in the evenings to create TOIL and as a short term solution spend more time earlier in the day with your mum.

It's a hard decision for you to make because each day is different with Alzheimer's or any type of dementia. Before my Nan passed away she would have "turns" where we thought she was ready to go, but turned out to be dehydration. The last one she had she couldn't speak, would eat, that was when we knew she was ready to go. Dementia is the long goodbye. Maybe up your visits a little, and keep in touch with the home more.

Thanks for the replies. I dont think I could reaslistically work in the evenings as I have a team who need me and other managers who look for me for queries etc so if I am workign I need to be available to them. I might speak to my boss and see what he says. I used holidays before to get some regular time off for Mum but HR were not keen on that. They advised I should reduce my hours. Also I need the holidays for the kids school holidays x

You can take time off unpaid. It's not fair taking time off when you aren't sick.

Get a sick note and take some time off to spend it with your beloved mum, it will also help with your stress/anxiety levels.

I’d take unpaid leave or use some annual leave, I wouldn’t ask the doctor for a sick note. Wouldn’t even have crossed my mind too as in those circumstances I’m not sick just wanting time off.

It sounds as if you have a great employer, offering great flexibility around your hours/working from home etc. Your employer may be more able to help than you realise. Maybe speak to HR and see if you are entitled to any "carer days" in the first instance. My DM had chemo some time ago and my then employer granted me one day a week off for 8 weeks so I could attend her appointments with her. Is there anything like this option available?

If not, can you rejig your hours at all? Eg work 5 days worth of hours across 4 days and take a day off?

If not, then, yep, I'd consider getting signed off (you only get one mum), but maybe explore your other options first.

Getting signed off sick when you're not sick is dishonest. If you work in a government role then it's taxpayers who are paying your wages. Be truthful with work and they may be prepared to make an exception and let you change your hours sooner.

You say you are diagnosed with stress and anxiety OP so I would get signed off. I would put my mum first.

I think it would be appropriate for you to ask for some compassionate leave, which I suppose might be unpaid in a similar way to parental leave. It doesn't seem from what you write that you are sick.

How old are your teenagers? Are they old enough to get themselves to and from their hobbies? Or they get themselves there, and you just pick up? That would give you a bit more time just to relax. And if you spend a lot of time running around after them generally, you could look for ways to reduce that and encourage them to take more responsibility.

You have stress and anxiety. Get yourself signed off.

Can you drop a day from your work or work from home, time shuffling work? Do you have flexible hours.

It sounds to me like your loved one is well cared for and lots of family support so you dont have to go in, but you'd like to ... there will come a time when they are at end of life and you may be the sort of person who wants to stay with them up to the death etc and there could be many times when it looks like the end has come but the person rallies, so I shouldnt use all your time up now, if you can avoid it.

I don't think you can be signed off for family stress. I have a severely disabled child and I once hit a really bad patch and sat in the GPs office sobbing and crying. The strain of caring whenever I am not working just got to much. I was told to take regular walks and think of ways to leave work permanently. I could not get a sick note (I had not taken sick leave at that point for a couple of years).

I don't think sick leave is appropriate in your situation. You could ask for some compassionate leave or take annual leave

if you have teens (under 18) you can take up to 4 weeks unpaid parental leave per year (if you haven't used up your 18 week allowance per child yet). I would look into some paid of unpaid leave and taking unpaid parental leave may be an option to free up 4 week of not working.

You should be looking to get dependents leave or unpaid leave. I don't think it's fair to get signed off sick to spend time with your mother. By the way my mother also has dementia so I really sympathise. You say she's well visited so she isn't on her own. Could you apply for flexible working. That's what I've done so I work late one evening so I can have a morning off in the week and visit when my mother is still alert. Also I do visit at weekends. I keep in mind that I never know how long this will go on for. So I try to play the long game to reserve my energy. It's hard being the so called sandwich generation - squeezed between duties towards children and parents simultaneously. And working still.

Thanks for the replies. Yes I would still ahve the 4 weeks of unpaid parental leave I've never used that. I had a look there at our policies as we do have a policy about supporting carers with flexible working and changing working patterns etc,. I think I need to speak to HR and my line manager. I have been diagnosed with stress and anxiety for past 3 years with Mums condition and being main person responsible for her & dad but I feel I can manage it on an ongoing basis with medication and its not like a flare up that I am feeling ill with it. I am just really sad for Mum and I want her to have company and not be on her own wandering about with no shoes and all the other things that go on. She was a teacher and would have just hated the way its all turned out but at least she is in a semi happy little bubble and a bit oblivious to it all. I would just like to be there with her and don't want to regret not being there in the future.

I’ve never had a problem being signed off sick. Once was with anxiety and stress. On other occasions, a GP has offered to sign me off sick and I’ve declined.

In your shoes OP, I would get signed off. In my mind, I’ll be working for 40 years plus paying NI and a higher rate of tax, what’s a few weeks off sick in that time when you are actually unwell, not skiving.

There are far worse things going on in the world and huge companies and billionaires not paying their fair share of tax.

But the OP is not working for a huge company or a billionaire, she's working for the government and by her own admission isn't currently sick. This is what unpaid leave is for.

I’m in a somewhat similar position to you. My DM is terminally ill and I wanted to spend some more time with her before she dies. I also work in the public sector as a manager. I’ve taken time off and felt the fairest thing to do was to take unpaid special leave. I’m fortunate in that I can afford to do that, I realise.

I don't think it would be right to use sick leave for this, even if a GP was willing to sign you off. Also, a few weeks off wouldn't be a long term solution so you would be better off putting in a flexible learning request to start later a couple of days a week. If you feel you want a block of time off to spend longer periods with your DM then this should be taken as annual leave or unpaid.

YANBU to want to take some leave to spend time with your mum, and to do so in line with your employer's policies.

YWBVU to take the time as sick leave if you're not actually sick.

If you’re not too sick to go to work you can’t lie to your doctor to be signed off; that’s not what sick pay is there for. Your stress/ anxiety is managed with medication to an extent that you’re able to work and so you do not need to be signed off. Of course we would all like to not have to work and to be able to spend more time with loved ones; one of disabled DC has a limited life expectancy and I would love to spend every day with her instead of going out to work and to be paid to do so but that’s not how the world works. It would never occur to me to lie and be signed off work sick so that I could have more time with her unless I was genuinely so overwhelmed I genuinely couldn’t face work.

You either need to find a way to take unpaid leave or change your working hours or look at another way to change your lifestyle so that you can have more quality time with your mother at weekends but sick leave is absolutely not there so that people who are well enough to work can have 6 months off to spend time with family, regardless of what the future is likely to hold for those loved ones.

@PlomBear the fact that you're going to be working for years applies to the majority of people and higher tax payers earn more in order to be paying those contributions. It doesn't alter the fact that sick leave is for when people are sick. It just appears that people's definition of sick is variable and somewhat elastic.

Could you visit in the morning instead of the afternoon?
Or perhaps arrange to start late and finish late a couple of days?