Friend and Continued Work Absence

[GentleWord]

I have a friend who has some mental and physical health diagnoses. She qualified as a teacher more than ten years ago. She has worked in different settings - state schools, private schools, and preschools.

Since then, she has had a few jobs as a teacher, but on average, she has up to half the time she is employed off sick. This does become an issue, and mostly she has to move on.

Never quietly. It usually goes through legal channels and I know the company have settled at least twice.

Before, I didn't think much about this, but now I have reason to think about schooling, I don't think it is fair that she keeps taking jobs that she cannot do. I'm actually unsure how she manages to get a new job with her history but apparently schools have only very recently been demanding of the last reference and now you can give "bad" references.

I don't think it is fair on the children to have a teacher who is so unreliable. I don't think it is fair on the staff. I think after a decade, it should be clear to her and her family that she cannot be a teacher. However, I think they cling to her profession as a status thing.

The same pattern is occurring again where shw is started to have repeated and medium term absences from a job she started last year. I think this time I should be a bit more honest with her about her career and the other people affected by how she engages with her job.

Unreasonable - dont say anything and just support her

Reasonable - find the words to say that teaching isn't an appropriate career choice.

What are you on about ? Have you seen the state of NHS mental health services ? Have you seen the vast numbers of charlatans in private counselling services? Stop talking rubbish. There is very limited help out there. Especially for women. I know this.

Sigh. Because she had to pick “a profession” to please her family. What would their reaction have been if she hadn’t followed a professional route?

And now she’s stuck in a profession that causes her enough health problems that she can’t continue to do it. But she still has earn a living (and please her family, presumably) - what else is she meant to do?

I don’t see where you’ve said how old she is or what her living situation is. That’s relevant too.

This is a woman suffering from total burnout, why can you not understand that?

You need to stop “imagining” and worrying about all these kids. The school and their parents can worry about them. I’m sure the school have good measures in place.
Leave your poor friend alone.

Something like finance /book keeping etc would be much better suited to her. Often work from home and more flexible hours as long as the job is done. (Ie can work into evening if mornings a problem)
teaching in person every day does not sound suitable for this person.

I know, right. This kind of response is so frustrating (edit to clarify: not your response, the post you were responding to). This mythical “help” that keeps getting thrown out as a solution to everything. I saw it yesterday on a thread about an autistic adult, as though someone can get “help” to cure their autism.

What kind of “help” do people imagine there is? And from whom?
There IS no “help”.

I disagree with this. Speaking as someone with a history of anxiety / IBS / chronic back pain / CFS / POTs and autism. She is on a salary so could afford therapy privately. I’ve tackled my issues with a mixture of - daily journaling, deep breathing, meditation, a nurosym device, guided hypnotherapy for IBS, and finding an exercise programme that works for my POTs and CFS. It’s totally possible to find a route to recovery that works for you. It’s taken a lot of research and diligence but there are so many free support groups and advice out there. It does get wearing when you see people taking endless time off work but apparently not using that time productively to get better.

"So people with disabilities should only be able to do certain jobs"

Everyone should only apply for jobs they can fulfill.

Things change yes and employers should adapt where possible, but seems OP's friend isn't in the right profession.

Have had a colleague who'd go off for months but miraculously recover in time not to go past the 6 month mark.
After a short while, the cycle would begin again. It is unfair and some don't play the system.

Also knew someone who was desperate to be a nurse, but had no ounce of empathy, yes she'd studied and qualified but treated patients with disdain.
Any meet ups would be spent with her belittling her patients, but any talk of change of career was met with, but I want an NHS pension.

She is on a salary so could afford therapy privately

Are you privy to her financial outgoings, then?

Do you know what her teacher’s salary is (not great if she’s job hopping and hasn’t progressed)? What her mortgage or rent is? How much she has left every month after all her bills are paid? Where she lives and if that’s an expensive area? If she’s shouldering all the bills on her own or has a partner to share the load?

No, you don’t. You have no idea whether she can afford private therapy. Stop spouting rubbish.

I think YANBU in that it does seem the stress of teaching is too much for her. But, she knows that she keeps going off sick. I'm not sure what else you can do or if your opinion would be enough to change her career path given that she seems very set on teaching as a profession. It sounds like she'd carry on anyway and just lose you as a friend. Maybe a supply teacher would work better for her so that she could take things week by week. Or there are other office jobs that you can do with teaching qualifications but maybe more working from home - something in ed tech for example? I think all you can do is be supportive and offer other suggestions if she looks for them.

Ok but that 'your' experience and that's not indicative of how everyone will be able to navigate a mental health journey. I have a friend who has just left teaching, she was and is an EXCELLENT teacher loved the kids (and them her) but reached burnout yet is really struggling and trying to have a career change. I did a brief stint in a secondary school and found it way too hard so left. Everyone is different.

Did not vote.

In answer to your immediate question – what are your motivations? Do you genuinely think that you providing your unsolicited opinion will cause her to rethink anything? Or is this a case of you getting increasingly frustrated and wanting to vent your spleen?

Of course, if she has asked you directly for thoughts or advice, then she may be open to what you have to say. And you can obviously choose how to word what you say to be productive rather than inflammatory.

In response to the substance of your concerns .... I can see where you're coming from. I have a colleague who I suspect has some quite serious mental health issues, and this is placing enormous burdens on all those around them. Between planned absences, reduced working hours, calling in sick (at times one or more times a week), falling out with colleagues over perceived poor treatment, asking colleagues for unreasonable levels of assistance with work ... it's gone well beyond reasonable adjustments in the Equality Act, and is causing enormous problems. Everyone has been patient and endlessly accommodating, and rather than things getting better they are getting worse. As you say, for a teacher, there is the added direct impact on the students, to the extent they end up with a series of supply teachers or other staff having to step in to take over classes at the last minute.

References nowadays seem to just give dates of employment. It’s not usual to supply more information.
i have a friend who was asked for a reference for someone who had been let go for their behaviour. She wanted to say more…
my DS school had a teacher who was off sick for months of the year, came back in July then off again late September for several years.
it cost the school money, they had to lose several TA and it stressed other staff.
and the Ofstead failed that year- teaching deemed adequate

''@InWithPeaceOutWithStress · Today 09:55
I disagree with this. Speaking as someone with a history of anxiety / IBS / chronic back pain / CFS / POTs and autism. She is on a salary so could afford therapy privately. I’ve tackled my issues with a mixture of - daily journaling, deep breathing, meditation, a nurosym device, guided hypnotherapy for IBS, and finding an exercise programme that works for my POTs and CFS. It’s totally possible to find a route to recovery that works for you. It’s taken a lot of research and diligence but there are so many free support groups and advice out there. It does get wearing when you see people taking endless time off work but apparently not using that time productively to get better.''

Good for you.

But it is disingenuous to suggest that everyone can ''recover''.

You don't ''recover'' from a life long disability or chronic health condition.

You can find ways to cope/manage better but it is inappropriate to suggest that everyone can just magically ''recover'' with a bit of therapy and journalling.

Nobody is going to ''recover'' from epilepsy, bipolar disorder, MS, Crohn's disease disease and many other conditions that way.

You don't ''recover'' from autism either.

I agree with you, and would probably feel the same, but as it doesn't really affect you directly (unless she's teaching your kids of course) I'd just support her - you don't have to tell her she's brilliant or what she's doing is right - just listen when / if she wants to talk about it to you. Maybe try a few open "how's it going?" style questions to encourage her to search for her own conclusions.

Is your friend's issue that causes her to be on sick leave related specifically to teaching/the nature of her job? (E.g. does she find the job stressful and end up signed off with stress? Or is it that, say, she has a back problem that keeps flaring up?)

Either way, I don't think I'd say anything in your shoes but I would feel the same as you - that essentially she may need to consider another job that she is able to do alongside whatever condition she is suffering from.

Of course it’s not fair as she isn’t capable of doing the job she is employed to do.

she needs to find something she is actually capable of doing.

I think an important consideration is whether it's the job that's making her ill? The fact that it's happened repeatedly in the same pattern, suggests perhaps it is. Absolutely workplaces must be 100% supportive and make reasonable accommodations, but if you are fundamentally not suited (either mentally or physically) to the nature of the work, no amount of support will enable you to do the job.

There are physically demanding jobs I couldn't do because of previous injury, in no world would I apply for a physical job I knew I couldn't do and then get signed off sick becasue my body couldn't cope with the work. I balance life as a carer for a family member with work, I know I don't have the mental capacity for high stress roles and have moved 'downwards' to a role that I have the capacity for. I'm very happy with that and consider it my responsibility to find a job that I am suited to, that I can deliver well within my capabilities and capacity.

If you wanted to say something, I'd kindly help her explore other options and support her to move past family expectations- it must be soul destroying doing jobs that repeatedly cause mental health breakdowns, but there will be something out there that she loves and is great at...

It’s a question of priorities. It’s possible to get counselling sessions for £45 an hour, you could have those twice a month if that’s all you could afford. All the other tools I mentioned are free or very low cost. If you’ve got a chronic mental health or pain issue then I would say you should prioritise your resources (time and money) into that. Rather than simply flinging your hands in the air and complaining that the NHS isn’t helping and otherwise giving up.

If someone is taking months off work but not proactively doing anything in that period to improve their resilience then of course they will burnout again when they return to work as nothing has changed.

this is why there is such a thing as 'reasonable adjustment'. There are plenty of ill or disabled people who would still be able to work as teachers, perhaps with reasonable adjustments made to ensure their needs are met. But equally in some scenarios, the candidate is not going to be able to fulfil the requirements of the role, and there aren't reasonable adjustments.

I would say, in this scenario, that the OP's friend's difficulties are to an extent incompatible with being a primary school teacher. One of the non-negotiables, really, is to be present as near to constantly as possible. It's not a job where a team can absorb your absence, as they can in many other roles - the children need consistency. They aren't receiving that. This woman seems to have a pattern of starting out OK and then taking the odd day of absence with eventually extends into long-term sick. If this is burnout, taking a job share role could help them preserve their MH. Or having a plan for how work is distributed over the day which builds in rest.

Nobody has a right to do whatever job they like. You always have to be able to do the work. I would argue that it's OP's friend's responsibility to assess the pattern presented in her periods of employment, and to reflect on whether this is actually serving the children she teaches. If she feels she can do better with support then she needs to discuss that with her employer, but she seems to coast from job to job. I find it hard to believe that none of her previous schools have tried to find ways to support her in doing her job. That would be first on their checklist.

That’s absolute bollocks. You are lucky that you had the money to throw at it.

I’ve worked in retail management for 22 years now. It’s not easy. It’s hard work and people are dicks.

It affects any job when someone has lots of time off due to illness. It is stressful and puts pressure on others.

Nice to see how little you think of us retail workers though.

Not at all. When I was on a lower income I simply accessed free resources such as NHS CBT courses. As soon as I was earning over £25k I sought out private therapy. However low cost alternatives shouldn’t be knocked. I believe I’ve gained more from daily journaling and meditation than from paid therapy. My personal experience is anecdotal but there is a huge evidence base behind practises like this. And I’m only saying what worked for me as an example, other people will need different things. My only point really was to question what the OPs friend is doing with all her sick leave. Spending half of her 10 year career off on sick is massive and it is baffling to see people do this knowing that other people have similar chronic health issues but just get on with it. It’s a really hard slog but if we all went off sick when chronically ill the country would stop functioning.

And how long ago did you access free NHS CBT?
Have you tried to do so lately?
What part of the country do you live in that you can afford £90 a month on private therapy on top of your mortgage or rent on 25k a year, and how long ago was that?
You’re talking absolute nonsense and assuming your experience and circumstances are the same
as everyone else, and making yourself look rather silly in the process.

Are you her carer?

Yes, some people are professionally on the sick. Rife in the public sector where being fired is more tricky.

Does this cause you to dislike her? Don't be her friend then.

I’ve accessed NHS CBT several times. First it was a ‘beating the blues’ e learning programme, then a 1:1 talking therapy and later a group therapy. I think the offer has got better over the years tbh, and talking therapies are now widely available on the NHS. As for private counselling, if she is off sick she is likely saving a fair bit of money from commuting, work lunches. She’s got the time to plan her weekly food budget and live in a low cost way to support spending on therapy if she thinks that’s what she needs. Although as I’ve said already, low cost alternatives are available and well evidenced.