Slacker on long term sick

rodo said:
Less scepticism and more compassion needed.
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Compassion comes in many forms. Patting people on the back (not too hard ;-) and telling them to take it easy for a while is not always a solution. I'd go as far as to say it's very rarely the solution, though millions on sickness benefits and the industry which has grown up to service them in this country seem to think differently.

It is very easy for people to say "oh, you're uncaring" or "you don't understand until you've been through it." But we all go through stuff like this to a greater or lesser extent. It's called living. Nobody gets out of this alive or completely sane, and it doesn't get easier as you get older; you just get more experienced at dealing with problems and disappointments.

I'm not washing my dirty laundry in public but I know a bit about the subject. But even at my darkest times I always knew there was only one person who could change my life. Me. And I always tried to keep a sense of perspective.

Stress is being responsible for hundreds of workers in a struggling business, looking after a handicapped child or elderly parent 24/7, facing terminal illness, or a chilhood filled with abuse. It's living in an Afghan war zone caught between forces you can't identify with or escape. Stress is an African mother giving birth alone a hundred miles away from any kind of health care, or a farmer watching his last goat die in a drought. Stress is being a Chinese worker living in premises owned by your boss and having to pay most of your wages to them, just so we can have cheap techno toys.

You get the idea.

Genuine mental illness is horrible. But stress is not mental illness, it's a sign we're not dealing with what life has thrown at us and we need to make changes ASAP, not in 6 months when we feel up to it. And depression is not a disease, it's a state of mind we can get ourselves into in exactly the same way as we get overweight. Bad habits. Refusing to face the difficult choices in life. Hiding.

I have a lot of sympathy with people who are genuinely ill in any way, shape or form. But we have sadly created a culture where -- by trying to help all who need it -- we have encouraged many who don't to believe they do, and given the workshy a licence to waste taxes which could be much better spent.

Good luck to anyone dealing with problems in life.

Andrew McP
 
smokedog said:
I have all the information I need. He's been to several interviews for other jobs and complains how he hates his current job. Fact is that he can't do his job (software developer), he's in over his head. All his work is just rehash of stuff he finds off the internet.
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You know this how?
 
I have been diagnosed with depressive disorder (which my doctor suspects i may actually have bipolar 2 because medication/therapy is only helping to manage the symptoms) and its NOT a case of 'buck up and stop being a wuss'

I have a mental illness caused by an imbalance of neuroreceptors in my brain. This can be somewhat corrected using medication, but we still understand so little about the brain that antidepressants are still very hit and miss.

the problem with these disorders is that so many people think they know what they are all about, and spout on about bucking up, and getting your lazy arse into work etc etc. Or, even worse, so many people fake depression/stress that getting your employer to take you seriously can be hard work.

Getting up and going to work is the hardest thing I have ever done. every day. I still do it, and only occasionally do I not manage and call in sick. fortunately my employers/managers are very professional and treat my condition seriously, for which I am eternally grateful. funnily enough, im fine once im there, and have no problem dealing with the stress at all (i work in a reasonably high pressure it role in a bank. if i **** up or cant get a service back up quickly enough, it can literally cost millions)
 
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NormanPorkinson said:
Anxiety and depression is something you can't possibly understand until you've been there and felt the effects. I suffered a bad bout of labrynthitis last summer and that left me with severe anxiety and mild depression. I've had several panic attacks that have resulted in me having to go to hospital on about 4 occasions, convinced I was having a heart attack and about to die. It's impossible to describe the feeling, but it literally feels as if the whole world is falling apart.

Hyperventilation which goes hand in hand with panic attacks and anxiety causes many symptoms that you can feel and see. eg. chest pains, heart palpitations, numbness, sweating, hyper activity, muscle cramps/twitches over breathing, nausea, dizziness etc... This is caused when the level of co2 in the blood becomes too low because it is being breathed out during hyperventilation.

This type of mental illness can literally put you in bed and make you a recluse and in severe cases lead to suicide. It's not worth talking about until you have felt what your mind is capable of and what symptoms can be felt.
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That sounds terrible. Has the Labrynthitis disappeared now? Something to try and keep doing is Yoga or Meditation. If you keep at it, they both can change your life.
 
The_TailGunner said:
I have been diagnosed with depressive disorder (which my doctor suspects i may actually have bipolar 2 because medication/therapy is only helping to manage the symptoms) and its NOT a case of 'buck up and stop being a wuss'

I have a mental illness caused by an imbalance of neuroreceptors in my brain. This can be somewhat corrected using medication, but we still understand so little about the brain that antidepressants are still very hit and miss.

the problem with these disorders is that so many people think they know what they are all about, and spout on about bucking up, and getting your lazy arse into work etc etc. Or, even worse, so many people fake depression/stress that getting your employer to take you seriously can be hard work.

Getting up and going to work is the hardest thing I have ever done. every day. I still do it, and only occasionally do I not manage and call in sick. fortunately my employers/managers are very professional and treat my condition seriously, for which I am eternally grateful. funnily enough, im fine once im there, and have no problem dealing with the stress at all (i work in a reasonably high pressure it role in a bank. if i **** up or cant get a service back up quickly enough, it can literally cost millions)
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I know exactly how you feel, there is still such a stigma associated with mental illness, depression inparticular. I wouldn't wish depression on my worst enemy. The problem is once you get that low, you don't feel you deserve help. From the outside it looks as your lazy, unreliable as even some of the simplest things can be extremely difficult to do, especially if it involves decision making. I think a theres a real problem with understanding, people thinking you can 'pull yourself together', it really is a potentially 'lethal' ilness.
 
The trouble with these sorts of illness is that there are many people who try it on so they can avoid doing their job. That then has an affect that people do not believe people who do have a genuine problem instead of just slacking off.

I have had issues in the past with stress due to things which were going on at work. I was fortunate that I realised that I was having a problem early enough and raised it with my boss. He realised that the situation I was in was untenable, (which was partly his fault), so work arranged for me to have some sessions with someone through our company health care to help and also made improvements in the office which removed the situation. From his perspective he didn't end up with a senior member of his team out for months on end and in the process ended up with an office which was running in a lot smoother manner. In my perspective I had about 50% of my workload removed, (mostly the boring slog work which was moved onto the people who should have been doing it originally), so I was only doing ~1.5 jobs which allowed me to breathe instead of being in a constant state of panic.

I have got a best friend who had bigger problems than that which did end up with him off work for 8 months on a lot of medication and having to stay out of work on Doctors orders. He would have loved to have been able to keep up with his hobbies etc but with the state he was in that just wasn't possible. Fortunately he eventually improved and now he's almost back to how he was and is back at his work again.

I do not have a high tolerance for people who use a false malady to get out of work but we have no where near enough information about the person involved to be able to make a judgement here.
 
Ahh mglover you have a chip on you shoulder the size of my house. You are also very biggoted and somewhat offensive in your posts.

Oh and you understand exactly nothing about mental health issues. Hope you know more about engineering!

By the way even little old me with an A Level in Psychology understands more than your "camebridge" educated brother!

I say until you have suffered mental health issues you can never trully understand them.
 
because stress that keeps you off work doesn't necessarily have to come from work. Work can just be the straw that broke the camels back, or the other stresses they are experiencing may mean they are incapable of performing at work.
 
Im still not sure I understand it. How is it a solution to send someone home, pay them to do so and then wait for it all to get better.

Is the job going to change, do they like their job. There are plenty that have genuine problems im sure but I cannot see how taking a break solves the issue.
 
I'm stressed out and on SSRI's for depression. But i'm not a lazy workshy bag of ****, so I still go in.

I refuse to talk to people who go off sick as "stressed" work sucks, life sucks, it's stressful. Man up and get on with it.

I really hope you are joking?
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He's got to have been, or has never had to work a crappy job in his life.
 
millsy888 said:
I really hope you are joking?
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I kinda agree with him. What is stressful about working at a supermarket. Little responsibility, very little brain work. If a customer gets angry just direct them to a manager who is trained to deal with it.
 
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