What sort of leave? sick leave, unpaid leave or doing the decent thing and resign

[needavice888]

DS needs currently a lot of help due to MH crisis. I manage work with WFH and going to the office some days (my work can in theory be done fully remote). His MH declined and he is now suicidal and I have to provide 24/7 suicide watch. DS is allowed back some hours into school but that is part time only and I need to take him to reception and collect from there to ensure seamless supervision (secondary school). I am not coping at all with any of it. No idea long this will go on for. could be over in a few weeks, My stress levels are through the roof, I don't sleep, I cannot eat, I cannot focus.

I really dont feel able I can work. Would it be unreasonable to get signed off (been at my workplace for many years and haven't had a sick day in years) or should I ask for unpaid leave given I am not ill (though I cannot really afford it - hence the idea of going off sick,). My friend said I should do the decent thing and resign if I cannot effectively work and dont know when things will improve.

I am not thinking clear and I am one of those who never take time off and always soldier on. So could do with some advice.

Special leave covers a multitude and depending on the organisation might cover you.

There's some excellent advice further up thread which hopefully is helping.

Get signed off. Nothing else matters but you and your family.

Definitely don't resign!! You might need to take unpaid leave (or be on statutory sick pay) at some point but that is a worst case. I would be pushing for a period of paid leave initially. You have given a lot to your employer, they should look after you now.

@needavice888 ok, if you’ve already taken the maximum for both your dc then no wiggle room there.

Where is other parent and family in all this - are you shouldering all this by yourself, no one even to ask advice or offer some respite?

Im concerned for you because it sounds like you need this job (heaven only knows, being stuck at home with a desperately ill child can feel like endless emotional and physical torture - the worry, the exhaustion, the isolation.

Going on sick seems a good solution - but how will you get out of that situation? If it ends up Long term sick that might end with you being managed out if you aren’t careful, and then it’s harder to get a new job.

Reluctantly I might do it, but Id start thinking about how I’ll support myself if I can’t ever get back into the job again.

Taking sick leave off work due to stress is not only triggered by stress in the workplace, it can also be triggered due to stress triggers outside work.

Go and speak honestly to your GP, I'm sure they will be supportive.

Hopefully your dc's MH stabilises, or it will at least give you breathing space to make longer term decisions with less pressure.

💗

How do you know op has given a lot to the employer? She may not have. I do the bare minimum tbh!

Stress. Get signed off sick. Don’t give it a second thought . I’m a manager and would expect this from someone in your position

I do t understand your friend's thinking. Many people who are signed off sick don't know when they will be better. This absolutely sounds like a situation where you should be signed off sick. Take no notice of your friend.

Well she says she’s been there a long time and hasn’t had a sick day in years so she’s given them a lot of her working life and presumably they are are happy enough otherwise they would have got rid of her in her probation period. Loyal employees are hard to find and high turnover of staff is difficult to manage.

I can assure you, I did give a lot!

@Icanttakethisanymore well you may be right as OP sounds very conscientious.

High staff turnover is certainly difficult to manage but so is supporting a gap in a team when you’ve no budget because someone is on long term sick. Then everyone else gets overworked, stressed and demotivated and the problem snowballs. That’s not OP’s problem of course. But you can’t assume people back in her workplace won’t be aghast if she disappears for a month.

you go off sick with stress - your friend needs to mind her own business

Colour me surprised.

I know OP I’m being provocative sorry.

Actually I think I come down on your “side” and say take the leave.

And make sure when you return to work you ask for what you need. No point going back and breaking yourself.

but while you are off, on 24x7 suicide watch, find some help - without the stressful distraction of work, all you’ve got is the endless, round the clock burden and desire to keep your dc going. Being a full time carer in that situation can cause you to spiral down.

Make sure you find some adults outside so your entire universe isn’t defined by the battle to keep your dc alive.

I understand it's difficult, but unfortunately this is what happens occasionally when you run a business and employ people. The OP deserves to be supported just like she has supported her employer in running their business for many years.

She has a son with what is currently a life threatening condition.

If I was in that situation and my workplace was so inhumane to be "aghast" at me taking time off as I was suffering from extreme stress due to it I wouldn't give a shit.

Thankfully I have more considerate colleagues and workplace. I have, thankfully never been in a similar situation, but have had colleagues off for various similarly important reasons and while it does make it somewhat challenging at work I totally understand their health is always the absolute priority.

It is a managers job to set the tone and make sure people know there are sometimes more important things than just work and protect their team when there are resource challenges.

If the GP deems she is unfit for work then of course she’s entitled to be on leave.

She is under no moral obligation to resign. The employer is under no obligation to support her beyond what is required of them by law or contract.

In my experience, the goodwill created by past good performance and loyalty does weigh into how the employer handles the occupational health interviews, but less than you’d expect in many cases.

Agreed.

Any decent employer wants to look after and retain their loyal and experienced staff.

I had to have a month off in difficult circumstances (not illness, homelessness due to abuse) and my employer paid me full pay. I worked for them for another decade after that and must have repaid their support many times over

Agree

Well it depends on the workplace a lot. Personal sympathy in spades when someone is in this position, but allow me to feel “aghast”. It’s not always vanilla. When I had someone out on sick every couple of days or weeks unpredictably due to a short term medical situation; I covered and helped. Then again whilst then two people go out on maternity leave and I’m given a pittance to hire cover so the poor folk I recruit are well-intentioned but not really up to covering the jobs; I’m working 60 hours a week to try and train them and hold the fort for regular-sick person; and then in the team next to mine where there was a redundancy due to “system improvements” that didn’t really exist, that team’s supervisor goes out on MH stress leave on full pay that lasts SEVEN months and the only people who can cover are me and my manager. And my manager and me stump up the extra hours to try and cover whilst we try and find budget for a cover person and GUESS WHAT my manager breaks under the pressure and gets a promotion and guess what else, I quit a month later and get a better job too.

And now I do the bare minimum and a four day week because, well, where did being a “good loyal employee” get any of us?

So my point was you cannot ASSUME sympathy and generosity and no, you don’t have to care about it. I specifically said : it’s not OP’s problem. It’s not.

Get signed off, don’t feel badly about it, tell your “friend” to piss off. That is all. Hope you’re okay x

This!

Please do get yourself signed off. You're clearly under a lot of stress. This is what sick leave is for.

I hope things improve for you OP. Hugs.

@WeAllHaveWings and by the way, when EVERYONE in the team has problems, what do you do then? One of us ‘lost’ a child (ex dp objected to 50:50 and took dc overseas and didn’t return) and was engaged in a dreadful legal custody battle. Another person lost a parent. Another person had a miscarriage. Another person had a mum with dementia in Eastern Europe and couldn’t afford to go and visit her before she forgot her altogether. One person had an undeclared history of mental ill-health and was completely unstable at work - our HR team forced us to keep her on full pay for three months until probation was up to see if we could “turn her around” (we couldn’t). The list went on and on.

Everyone has sympathy for what’s going on outside work, half the time you’ve no idea what’s going on behind the scenes. But the feeling of “oh god how will we cope with this next crisis” is a real feeling, I’m entitled to feel it without being told I’m basically an evil /inhumane git.

OP is entitled not to give a shit about what problems she may be leaving behind. I’m not calling her an evil/inhumane git am I?

Oh and to add, I'm an employer of a small business. There are less than 20 of us in total.

If one of the team went off on long term sick, it would absolutely make business more challenging.

BUT, I always tell my staff that family comes first. If I knew someone was struggling, I'd be encouraging them to take the time off and getting signed off. I most definitely would not be wishing they'd resign instead. Your friend is most definitely a bitch and, although I don't wish ill on anyone, I wonder what she'd truly do if she were in the same position.