Has anyone taken time off for exhaustion?

[Vap0]

Hi

I'm 24 weeks and have a very demanding job which is essentially a driving job (45,000 miles per year) where I call into places to carry out my work, it is very long hours, 10 hours a day minimum. We have been to a few shows with work recently which makes the working day longer which is making the days 12-14 hours. I stay away a lot in hotels too which adds to the tiredness. I contacted my manager about the tiredness a couple of weeks ago telling him I am struggling with the long hours and call rates (3.5 calls per day is required and I have dropped this to 3 per day) and do not have the energy I had before being pregnant to which he replied saying ok. At a show last week he made a totally inappropriate and sarcastic comment (this may have been meant as a joke but nobody took it that way) about the amount of work I am doing not being enough. My contracted hours are 9-5.30 however that is entirely unrealistic with the amount of work required. I think he wrote his email response which was legally acceptable to ensure he isn't leaving himself open to any come back but thinks he can bully me back into upping my call rates. I haven't spoken to him since luckily. I don't take breaks in the day, driving between places used to be enough of a break for me but isn't cutting it anymore. I spend my weekends on the sofa struggling to do anything and evenings when I get home, if I'm lucky enough to go home, I'm straight in pj's and early to bed. All I'm doing at the minute is working and sleeping, it is just exhausting. So far I haven't had any time off sick.

Anyway, sorry for the ramble.

How do I word taking time off sick for tiredness? Can it be just that? It sounds pretty lame to me and I dread making a phone call to say I won't be going out to work today because "I'm just too tired". Has anyone done this? What was the reaction of your employer? If you get a dr's note do you need one for every day you take off?

Thanks in advance.

I'm currently signed off work by my gp (not really through tiredness, more stress and depression related) and he didn't actually put the problem on the sick note, he just wrote 'pregnancy related illness' - that could maybe be an option? I've been signed off for two weeks on one sick note then he's going to review. What a crap situation to put you in, I really feel for you!

Where I work you can self certify for up to 7 days then need Dr's note. Does your company have a sickness policy, for me if I have more than 3 episodes of sickness in 12 months then I would have to have a formal interview with manager and Occ Health even if it was only 1 day each time but if I was off for 6 months once I wouldn't! Other places are different so worth checking as it may influence what you decide to do.

Yep I was signed off by the gp and you can do that the whole way through should you need to. I was utterly exhausted because of anaemia so check for that kind of thing too. My work were shits about it and tried to make me go back in - they eventually sent me to the occupational health assessor who said I shouldn't be at work. I felt at the time my pregnancy was very much more important than my job although at the time it wasn't a career and I knew I wouldn't go back so not sure how I'd have felt were it something I cared about losingz

I took a few days off for exhaustion, My boss was very snippy about it. There were days when I couldn't move from exhaustion, let alone have functioned.

Several times she told me "you're pregnant, you're not ill" and "If we took time off every time we were tired, there'd be nobody in". A few weeks later occ health sent me home for the rest of my pregnancy and my boss was even more pissed off then! ( I had SPD too). My DC was 11lb at birth!

My advice is get a doctor's note and don't give too much detail.

I took a few days off in my last pregnancy when I was exhausted (I was having I travel) and I knew I just needed to rest up. I signed myself off with something vague like 'pregnancy related sickness'. It made a massive difference to my ability to cope when I returned.

Go see your gp. I'm signed off at the mo (for different reasons). On the form it's has he option of reducing hours or being signed off completely. Maybe you could do half days if you felt up to it or something. You and the baby are more important than any sodding job

Thanks for all the replies.
seven if you reduce your hours will they pay you less do you know?
Although if I just had a note that said I could work 9-5.30 and no more then that would absolutely manageable.

Yup. I got signed off not long ago with exhaustion and sinusitis. 6 weeks in total! Was so poorly!

By law no work place can penalise you for being off sick while pregnant.
My boss tried to give me a disaplinary for it until my dr wrote him a letter.

Doesn't matter how long you're off as long as it's pregnancy related (Which exhaustion can be!) you're fine xx

Yes i did. I took a week off around week 24. I was fainting for england and was advised by gp to relax and sleep. Hope you feeling better x

Your boss is a Grade A prick.

Go and see your GP and get bloods to rule out anaemia etc and ask them to put pregnancy related illness on sick note.

No idea about the reduced hours affecting pay but I doubt it. Good point about the checking for anaemia. I'm nearly 36 weeks and it was discovered I was anaemic at 34 weeks (not why I was signed off though).

I think they can make you use anual leave to reduce your hours or require you to take it unpaid if you reduce hours (but not sure how it works now they have introduced fit notes as the alternative would be to be off sick on full pay) You could ask personel how it works if your company has a personel department.