Is no sleep a reasonable excuse for calling in sick to work?

[Catermellor]

Is ‘I haven’t slept at all’ a reasonable excuse for not going to work?

I really haven’t. I might have had two hours maybe 9-11 and then maybe dozed for half an hour between 4 and 430’but that’s it and that’s a generous guess. I feel all shaky and horrible and I just want to catch up on some sleep.

Well your employer is wrong. Utter BS.

You're fine to call in sick, as you're unwell and not able to work - the cause is irrelevant in this case.

Ignore the dickheads who think we should be crawling into work over broken glass, there are no medals for ridiculous presenteeism.

Thanks @88MullahsonZoom , she’s two, she has a pillow but I’ll try tilting a bit. She’s never been brilliant but last night was awful. I went to bed at 9 because I’d had a bad night the night before and from about 11 onwards she just didn’t settle. Every time I started to doze off she woke up again.

My work demands verrrrry high standards so if I’m not on the ball and get ‘caught’ I’ll have excruciating follow up emails and scrutiny. So in all honesty I’d rather just write today off. It’s not ‘I’m tired’ so much as ‘I’m completely fucking broken, defeated and drained!’

Yeah, it would where I am. If you’re off mon to fri and then the following Monday, you’d have been off for eight days and need a doctor’s note unless you said you recovered on the Saturday or Sunday and then opened a new instance of sickness.

But a Friday absence wouldn’t automatically count as a three-day absence. Not unless you said you didn’t recover until the Sunday!

Unless you are a surgeon or a driver or something, I’d say suck it up.

I had night after night of sleep like this for months with my poor sleeper ds. I used to cry before going to work. It’s amazing how little sleep you need to carry on, but not pleasant

If you do want to ring in sick, make something up that’s more understandable

Oh and me. And I look back and think I should have cut myself some slack actually as five years on it doesn’t matter that you had the odd day.

I keep telling myself it will get easier one day.

You’re pissed off and tired but ultimately you can absolutely power through one day of work - get up, have a shower, drink coffee and get out in the fresh air. You can have a lazy weekend and catch up on sleep then.

I rarely get more than 3 hours a night due to chronic insomnia. I go to work 5 days a week. Resilience is a characteristic that really is worth working on. Am I shattered a lot of the time? Yes. Do I have a choice? Not really.

You do have a choice but if I was your line manager I would be a bit internally rolly eyed if you took one of your two working days off due to a bad nights sleep.
Also depends on how many people would be inconvenienced by me not being there. I wouldn’t want my colleagues to have to pick up the slack -my job is customer facing so the total amount of work still needs to be done even with less people there, there’s no ‘putting it off till I get back’.
So ultimately unless you are going to be a danger to yourself and others, I think push on through.

if your job is likely to kill everyone by you falling asleep, then call in sick. But if not, just suck it up. I’ve done plenty of night shifts before and then had to stay up all day to look after my child.

It depends on the job. If peoples
lives are in your hands them yes, and there are probably fatigue polices in place in your workplace in that case.

if it’s a desk job then no way.

I had a child that didn’t sleep for years, I know the feeling, but it’s tomorrow the real
tiredness will hit. You can’t take 2 days off.

Same.

You’ve already decided you’re calling in sick OP, so not sure why you’re asking here really.

I find Im usually fine the day after no sleep (Feel grim first thing then perk up)- until the following evening when I really crash. A second bad night and its a different story.

Why?

You had two and a half hours. You said so.
Regardless, you’re not sick, you’re tired.
You asked the question if it would be ok to call in sick. I gave my opinion it would not. Why are you asking if you just want everyone to agree with you that you should call in sick? If that’s what you want to do, then do it but no point in asking then arguing with people who say no.

of course it won’t.

I had many sleepless nights with my mum who had dementia, and on one occasion was in A & E all night with her - but I never phoned in sick for that reason.

I’ve done it before. My boss is very understanding. I have really bad insomnia. I have a 45 minute drive and do a 12.5 hour day ( not every day) though so it’s a bit more manageable.

I have gone in after no sleep at all.several times (thanks peri menopause!). But office job. I told my colleagues I had had no sleep and they appreciated that I was struggling and there and were generous with the tea! I tried to do non complicated things! But it was not as bad as I thought it would be.

Sorry if I have missed something but if your child is ill won’t you have to take the day off to look after them?

What? Why?

I agree.

The weekend would also be counted as sick leave days in any (shift work) workplace I know unless you notify them otherwise. Friday Saturday and Sunday, that’s 3 days.

But on Monday to Friday roles, the weekend only counts as sick leave if you take the Monday off too, then it’s 4 days.

That’s true.

Looks like my firm did this, think present one does too.
I was off on a Friday, Monday and Tuesday and in my record I had off five days as they counted the weekend too.

I had tonsillitis and had had antibiotics.

It isn’t worth trying to battle through illness sometimes.

I think it took me a couple of days to get a Doctors appointment, or I would have been off earlier than the Friday.