To be shocked at how much time off sick some people have?

[Enfys1982]

I work in a school and since I started in the sector it’s been a bit of eye opener to me how much sick time some people seem to take, and it always seems to be the same people. Days here and there, sometimes weeks on end then they come back for a bit go off again. As I said always the same people.

The last time I was off was last year when I had Covid, and I was only off because then you still legally had to isolate if positive. I actually felt well enough to go in. Before that I genuinely can’t remember when I was off sick. If I feel bad I just dose myself up and get on with it.

AIBU to think it displays a lack of resilience?

Wow you're amazing. Gold star.

So agree with this, esp the bit about lack of resilience = weak.

It's like a weird form of victim blaming.

Some people have so much regular time off on the sick it becomes the norm and people accept it . I am rarely on the sick as fortunately I enjoy good health. But in the rare occasion that I do - omg 😱 all hell breaks loose and all I get is questions and where were you we had to do XYZ . Turn cart wheels and handstands!

I'm self employed, pay PAYE taxes but only get SSP, which is too hard to claim. I'm very rarely off despite having both bipolar and other physical health issues.

In contrast, I've worked on various projects where it was the norm for employees to go off for 6+ months at a time on full pay. Often half the team with no cover brought in.

My partner manages a time (inherited) where half of them are off with 'anxiety' 6+ months every year.

If they didn't have sick pay they'd be at work. This would give them routine and a distraction. I've worked through long, bad episodes and was better off for it.

*team not time

If they didn't have sick pay they'd be at work. This would give them routine and a distraction. I've worked through long, bad episodes and was better off for it.

Good for you. I used to shit myself (literally) when my anxiety was at its worst. Not sure my colleagues would be too impressed with having an extra person to clean up.

Resilience is a core part of recovery in both psychiatry and therapy.

I never used to get unwell, then after a horrific chronic pain experience to years I was so run down I couldn't stop getting ill.

In one year I had terrible shingles, tonsillitis, infected wisdom tooth, a migraine monthly where I couldn't move, covid twice, and a horrendous sickness bug. I was absolutely demented. I have always been a healthy person I'm early 30s.

What could i have done? I work for myself so no sick pay but it was just vile.

Totally agree, OP. I haven't had any time off sick in over 12 years. I consider it a point of honour to keep it to a minimum. You'll notice that self-employed people are rarely off sick, because they can't afford to not be paid. There seems to be a belief from some in the public sector that they're "entitled" to a certain number of days of sick leave. But one also has to ask why management allow them to get away with all these casual one or two days off sick.

I’ve had two severe reactions to the Covid jab. The first one wasn’t recognised initially.

l had the last one on Oct last year. Still unwell. Obviously l lack resilience.

Resilience is so badly used as a buzzword currently. It doesn't mean push on and cope regardless it means building up resources to be able to weather unexpected events. (Rather like earthquake preparedness is not about telling people not to be such wimps when the earthquake strikes but have plans, equipment, procedures in place to deal with the emergency)

For sickness resilience comes from personal responsibility (looking after health) but it also comes from the organisation having good procedures to cope with inevitable occasional staff absence, and flexibility to reassign duties if someone can work but not undertake certain tasks. Some jobs are so stressful that you can't do them well if you are a bit ill (and often these same jobs are ones that collapse if you don't go in so left with an impossible choice)

Some people take the piss with sick but many more people have their talents wasted and get forced out to sickness benefits because of unforgiving work environments. This is a national problem and most low paid work environments are completely unconducive to good health (punitive sick policies being a prime example)

Schools are so thoroughly cut to the bone that it is destroying staff health. Sickness is often burnout and those people soldiering on working through illness risk destroying their own resilience by leaving nothing in reserve for the next illness.

You could take medication to not have an upset stomach, not eat that day if nervous or bring a change of clothes.

I've worked around very serious symptoms. Sometimes the solution is practical.

No good psychiatrist or therapist recommends avoiding something if anxious - that makes it worse.

Thanks to the “I’m alright, Jack” attitude of dosing yourself up because you feel well enough to work I am without any sense of taste and smell since 2018 and a former colleague caught a work cold, got pneumonia and died.
I think it’s worse when people refuse to take time off because of their own self importance.
Take time off when you’re symptomatic and contagious- I don’t want to hear another person bragging they were spraying out of both ends all night but they still came to work

Or people could stop being twats about MH issues. Its not like I didn't try various solutions. Ffs.

It's more 'ableist' to assume everyone with a disability / chronic illness takes loads of sick time.

I'm so worried about being lumped in with those people that I never disclose.

Maybe don’t keep getting Covid jabs?

Couldn't have said it better!
I've got chronic conditions and being judged is just another thing to deal with on top of them.
Being judged when I had a severe bout of depression was the worst. I came close to suicide because of it, the only thing that stopped me was the thought of my family who would be left behind.
Please think twice before judging OP.

You might have jinx’d yourself now op. Used to say I had excellent attendance last 15 years but in a flash can’t now. I hate 2023!

I woke up with a summer cold this Tuesday, though pretty glad I’m not in employment at the moment got to say.

Recently sent a sorry and get well card to an ex. Colleague who had an emergency hysterectomy last week and lost her job to boot because of being in probation after being blue lighted to hospital. Couldn’t believe who she worked for really, you would think there would be more care and to be so near the end of probation, I could cry for her.

Lots of people with severe depression do continue to work without taking time off though.

You can't tell by looking at someone what they have.

My issue is some companies have serial long-term sick leave types and the resilient staff (who also have mental health issues) but a different attitude, end up covering for them.

If you read the post, the first one wasn’t recognised…..🙄 which is why l thought the next one would be ok.

But thanks for your advice. That’s something I’d obviously never thought of..🤨

I had 4-5 years like that in my late 30s.

I got chicken pox, which left me really low for a long while afterwards, followed by repeated attacks of shingles, a kidney infection that nearly put me in hospital, flu (which I've only had 3 times in 30 years), concussion from a fall, gastric problems that turned out to be a hiatus hernia after loads of tests and time off, viral pneumonia, food poisoning (campylobacter, so again left me low for several weeks) from a meal in a pub that nearly got closed down because their kitchen was so filthy, and chronic sinusitis that eventually equired surgery.

And back then I suffered from frequent migraines that had me vomitting up to 12 times an hour for 24-48 hours, and I was asked at work why I couldn't just take painkillers and go in.

Eventually, I was dismissed under the capability procedure: I couldn't do my job because my attendance was so poor.

Things started to improve after that. I got a job with a charity that was WFH and hardly ever got anything worse than a cold, a newly-qualified GP prescribed me anti-sickness meds in suppository form, so I could take my migraine meds without puking them up 5 minutes later, and I was really pretty well, although arthritis started to be a problem when I hit my mid-50s.

When my partner died, I hadn't had a single day's sick leave for over 2, maybe 3, years, and have only had one day off in 18 months (my old friend shingles again!).

There are 6 on my team, I'm nearly 68 and have the best absence record out of everyone. WFH makes a big difference imo, I don't catch much from people and can choose where I sit to work. I represented someone at a benefit tribunal from my bed once, when my back was bad - telephone hearings are great for that!

Right, now imagine 4/6 of your team are off for 6+ months with no cover.

That happened to mr at one job. I ended up working 12+ hour days including Saturday work.

I told the company post-offer I had bipolar. Since I wasn't an employee, no-one cared about my rights. I had a total of 5 sick days (one week - flu) in 9 months. I was then called into a meeting a criticised for taking time off when I 'knew they were understaffed.'

• Me not Mr.

I only do solo work now. I reject projects where I end up carrying employees.

I work in welfare rights, and exclusively with clients with MH problems, but plenty of them have physically problems as well.

I do 2-4 PIP applications a month, only around 40%-50% are successful. I then appeal them. My appeals are 100% successful. (The low initial success rate isn't because I'm shite at the applications, it's a little higher than the average for my team, and the team's success rate at appeals is in the high 90's.)

If it was easy to "milk the system", I doubt if the success rate for appeals would be so high.

Staying on earnings replacement benefits because you're sick isn't easy either. It's hard to get deemed incapable of working, and the success rate for those appeals is incredibly high, too.

They're even trying to get carers back to work now. A friend is FT carer for her 15YO son, who has a autism and MH issues, and gets carer's allowance. She's also getting ESA for herself, albeit only at the basic rate (and reduced somewhat because she gets carer's allowance as well).

She was summoned to an appointment at the job centre to be interrogated about what she was doing to find a job, and her response that she was a FT carer was ignored. I'm going to go with her next time, armed with a copy of the rules and regulations.

All of which is why I know that it's hard to "milk the system" when it comes to health benefits, and that the (imo few) people that succeed should take up acting, because they must be bloody good.

If you haven't seen it, @hattie43 , I reommend the film "I, Daniel Blake". For people working in welfare rights, it felt like watching a documentary, it was so true to life.

Exactly.

And why don't people who make up lies about people 'milking' the system stop to think about why people might want to do that, if it were true?

A happy, healthy society would mean happy, healthy work environments people looked forward to participating in; if people really are going to desperate and illegal measures, risking imprisonment and poverty, for meagre incomes on precarious benefits, there must be something terribly, disastrously wrong with workplaces, colleagues and working environments to be causing this. The focus ought be on fixing that, on making work fulfilling and worthwhile.