On work sickness...

[annwfyn]

I was reading this this morning and felt the usual wrench in my stomach.

I hate articles like this. I hate them with a fiery passion.

Maybe there are people out there, who skive off every Monday, but I know way more people who struggle into work whilst every muscle in their body is aching, and they are shivering slightly with fever because 'I've already had too many days off sick'. Maybe there are people who just don't bother, who would be vastly motivated by the abolition of sick pay, but I think there would be more people suffering from serious conditions like cancer who's illness were being seriously worsened by the stress of not being able to pay their rent/mortgage. Maybe the majority of sick days do come from people who are just lazy, as this article suggests, but I think I've seen more people take time off because they had pneumonia, or a fever of 103 degrees, or couldn't actually talk and could only make little croaking noises.

I hate articles like this because I don't think we are a nation of skivers. I think we're a nation of workaholics, with a vastly distorted notion on the importance of work.

I think the kind of 'drag yourself into work, no matter what' culture will actually lose businesses a lot more money in terms of decreased productivity, when it becomes the norm for every virus to go all the way around the office, and to keep going as people insist on coming in, sitting listlessly at their desk for the day, and then staggering home, never quite getting better and passing the disease on to everyone they know.

And finally, I am fairly sure that in the world that that writer lives in, it wouldn't be possible for anyone with long term health problems to get a job at all. Why would any of these tough go getting companies with no tolerance for human weakness hire someone with arthritis, or chronic asthma? And who the hell is going to pay for those people to eat if that world came to pass?

Gah! And argh!

Comments

Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired

[badgersandjam.livejournal.com]

Speaking as someone with, essentially, chronic arthritis (and chronic asthma, for that. And chronic stomach disorders, and...you get the picture) I will attempt tp pull myself in most days, on the knowledge that it simply won't get better. I have, in the past, had to call in with "excuses" such as "horrible histemic reactions--can't wear clothes" and whiplash injuries/nausea where I got halfway to work and then had to abort the drive, calling in from wherevcer I happened to be. I was excoriated for things like this. But when I struggled in, vomiting or whatever, I was sent home, then excoriated. And when I did work, I wa so exhausted that I'd go to bed at 5 or 6 PM. This is probably a contributing factor to my marriage failing. Chronically fit people (like my husband) simply cannot conceive of what it's like to be chronically ill. No matter how often I refer them to www.butyoudontlooksick.com (read Spoon theory, if you haven't).

Only being able to be awake for 20 minutes outside of work is not living. It's not even a way of life. It is, in fact, appalling. This also applies to my cousin who works 70-hour weeks. WTF is that all in aid of? There is no point in sacrificing your life to something that doesn't really matter in the long run. If that means you take a sick day now and then, then FFS take it.

My old job in the States had "administrative leave" days. 3 per year. For when you woke up and just said "f#ck it, I'm not going in." I took one when it was about 110 degrees Fahrenheit and I just stayed home and cranked up the AC till it was the temperature of a cave inside my flat. THAT is humane.

Frankly, if you don't give me sick days, you're going to wind up with me written off for months.

I'm probably wibbling coz I'm still tired from travel. My final suggestion is to take a crowbar to the knees of the writer and put him in a chair for a while; make him negotiate the Underground whilst in a chair; and see how he does.