why can't I get parental leave or career break instead of having to go on long term sick?

[thunksheadontable]

I have had moderate to severe pnd with some obsessive compulsive anxieties related to my baby son's health and am on mat leave. Due to return 7th May. I requested parental leave to start July but was told would have to go to Occ Health. No one involved in my ongoing care has suggested I can't return and my CBT therapist wrote a letter saying I would be okay to return on phased return with minor adjustments e.g. not being asked to take on additional sessions and limiting travel to one particular setting which is a two hour commute each way.

Occ Health have said I am not fit to return and I may never be 'able for the responsibility of my job'. Wtf? I have a good sickness record and I am in close contact with my team and senior supervisors and there are no concerns with my competence.. I am actually considered pretty highly in terms of my skills for the job and am continually told this! I missed no time at work because of this illness. I requested extra time because I was so unwell in the early months of my son's life and I want that time now for us.

I work in a specialist mental health trust though not in mh myself. They are a Mindful Employer. It really has knocked me for six that they can say I am unfit.

Would it be possible for you to go on unpaid leave for a while? I took a one year unpaid sabattical immediately following my maternity as my son had one going health issues due to his prematurity. My dh was able to financially support me but I understand that it may not be an option for some. It is worth asking & more beneficial for your work not to pay out sick leave. also better for your emplyment history not to go on long term sick.

whilst I understand your annoyance, parental leave does not need an OH say so, your PND bares no importance on this, classic passing the buck, I don't know if your OH are aware of it but sound like they do and are inexperienced and think they are helping you in your need of it, (I would have passed this refereal back to the manager if it was clear on the referal it was about other leave)
2nd OH will have been only answering a question by your employer so "will thunks be able to return to full duties in the next 6 months/ year?" they in my opinon thunks is not "able for the responsibility in my job"...you have misquoted so it could be you are not reading this right
take a step back and breath, re read and ask your line manager for your OH referal it will have the questions the manager asked on it, if you haven't seen it, then get your union involved, hell get them involved now.
none of this until you are back at work or ready to go back is OH.

from a personal note I hadn't heard of parental lave until last year talking to a HR advisor at work, I was amazed I had a years mat leave and thought I ws in heaven compared to my friends a couple of years before, she said she would talke her 9 month but no way parentla leave as it wwould effect her ??? emplyment rights on returning, as in not like when you return from mat leave and redundancy...sorry to be vauge we where eating sandwiches walking up the side of a duel carrageway in feb last year, it was freezing that I remember :)

You maintain employment rights on parental leave I think?No written report yet and there won't be for some time as met with nurse and have been referred to OH physician on April 12th. The irony is I contacted work about parental leave at the stage I would to have clarity on when to start childcare for financial reasons e.g. if starting in May would begin transition in April and as he has been put down for sessions then they need to be cancelled at start of March or I will lose money. Nurse at OH said I am unfit to work for three months e.g. until May so is effectively saying I am unfit to work at a time I am unpaid and not seeking to work anyway! Still no clarity on return to work date but I am so sick of having to go forward and backward.

I was trying to do decent thing with unpaid when psych had said you are entitled to sick leave if you want it as you have been so ill and this time with your baby is good for your recovery and what you pay NI for.. but she agrees I am fit for work if I want to. I think I will end up taking sick leave but I find not knowing when I am going back to plan and mentally prepare quite tough. It is hard enough to go back after mat leave without having to direct all these numpties in how to do their jobs!

Raisah that is what I want: unpaid. We are willing to bear financial brunt here, I just need it rubber stamped. It really isn't good for my confidence to be told I am unfit to work. It has been a tough year and I am actually doing well and continuing to work hard at it: surely they can't say how I will be in three months when they don't know me or much about my case and no one really knows how I will be? It is just infuriating. I just want to agree a return date for my own peace of mind.

Does it actually matter what it's called? As long as you get the time off when you are vulnerable, then that's what matters. If you are unfit for work, then sick pay is your right. If you are fit for work but don't want to be working right now, then yes, you need other options.

It's not common for OH to say you aren't fit for work, unless you aren't.

Yes but I'm not supposed to be at work at the moment Lougle, they have said I am unfit for work for the next three months when I am on unpaid maternity leave anyway - OH really doesn't need to say what I am or am not right now and I suspect that as much as anything the idea of me "not being fit for work" was because as part of the interview, I was asked to give a chronology of my illness in which I had to share my (frankly appalling) treatment on the NHS. Treatment in which I was told repeatedly my anxieties about my son's health were "anxiety" and persuaded that weighing him would be "obsessive" and told again and again that my concerns "weren't shared by anyone else" and that I "should think about what that means" until.. lo and behold.. finally he was weighed and he had dropped from the 91st centile at birth to 0.4 of a centile at 22 weeks, and everyone suddenly freaked and THEN said - after telling me for WEEKS that my anxieties were "just anxieties" - that it was "as well that I had come to this realisation [myself] as it would have been uncomfortable if external agencies had had to become involved". Well yes, quite.. but actually I was the only one pursuing my "anxieties" while everyone responsible for my care was actually saying that he was fine and it was just my health anxiety .

I complained in writing and then had a series of horrendous meetings with so-called "professionals" who had had limited contact with me trying to "explain" that my anger that my son was malnourished was nothing to do with the advice I had been given not to weigh him, it was "projection" etc, etc - including one with a psychiatrist where he started shouting at me because I asked him to consider why he was using such aggressive nonverbal language. Luckily I had been having weekly CBT with a supportive NHS therapist who attended the meetings and basically managed to diffuse the situation and support me in complaining.

I explained all of this without saying one negative words against the professionals in my care, I simply said that I had been given a new psychiatrist and when asked why explained dispassionately and without being upset etc the reasons why without giving details really. My health visitor, the CBT therapist and my GP all supported me and I had some key supports on the perinatal mental health team who supported my position but unfortunately some "professionals" can be very defensive when blamed and try and blame it on the patient. I have seen this and actively spoken out about it my whole career in my own department. I didn't discuss this with OH but I am fairly sure they are worried that my experiences would make me vulnerable to wanting to, you know, treat patients rather than slavishly follow care pathways even if they are wrong for a particular individual. They won't think that consciously but the culture of the NHS is such that the fact that a consultant disagreed with my assessment of the situation means a) I am clearly "ill" and "irrational" and b) because it was a consultant, the input of a whole raft of other professionals who worked far closer with me and for longer counts for pretty much nothing, despite the fact that he had seen me a handful of times over the course of a year and didn't remember me from one appointment to the next.

It sounds paranoid, I know.. but I have seen some of your other posts Lougle and I think you have experienced some of the realities of how the NHS can operate when it is challenged. I think my career is effectively over really, I won't be able to work in the system.. I just don't think it's because I'm "ill" and I don't really want to end my time working in such a way that it appears I had diminished capacity when that just isn't the case.

We are restructuring this year and sadly what your absence is called does make a real difference. Long term sickness counts against you, sadly, in a way that unpaid leave does not. I am actually fine. I'm probably better than I have been in years and I can tell you I am a lot less irrational than a lot of my colleagues some of whom really are off the wall in how they conduct themselves at work!