Mental Health issues or Challenges of Life?

PoliticsNerd

No-one is suggesting that one would not sympathise with real mental illness. (Labradora)

No, just that you are not, as MissAdventure's post points out, qualified to decided what "real" is.

I never suggested that I was qualified to tell the difference ! Just that, a qualified professional having designated somebody as having a genuine illness, for example clinical depression, one would naturally have the greatest sympathy with that person ; Indeed also for the people that live with them and manage it.
What I think is a dangerous trend is people self diagnosing any of the unavoidable stresses of life as "mental health issues".
Most normally and for very many people , they are unavoidable stuff that you have to manage.

I have a theory about the prevalence of mental-health problems in the latter part of this century. Don't shoot me, it is only a supposition, and I know that such problems have always been with us anyway...

Before the Internet, people were dependent on libraries, schools, institutions, books, newspapers, etc, etc, for their information - on just about everything.

These all involved direct interaction with other people. Even buying a newspaper meant speaking to a human being - even if it was only the news-vendor outside the tube-station.

Now you can gather just about all the information you need on any matter by staring at a small screen on your phone or PC device, without ever physically interacting with anyone. For days, weeks, for ever even.

Of course, the very young still interact with each other at schools and universities, etc - when they are not glued to their phones that is.

... then we have social media - where bullying and abuse is rife.

I'm not about to expand a thesis on this - others more qualified have done it anyway.

I just wanted to say that I believe that the internet is both a blessing and a curse, and part of that curse is that it has destroyed the human interaction that is a necessary part of being human. And, I don't think we were, as a society, intellectually ready for it.

Wyllow3

You've given us a good idea of your situation many times Doodledog (ie feeling dumped with a workload under particular circumstances), but what do you think could be done?

I think that the focus should change from people having a mental illness being a means to avoid doing things they don't want to do, to one where it means that they take responsibility for working out what they can do, and working with that.

I have used the situation with one colleague to illustrate a wider problem, really.

I wonder if posters could just read what is written and reply to that, not some imaginary reply that they wish to attack? Who does pay for a service they dont receive Doodledog?
The irony!

As you say, very few people pay for a service they don't receive, so if businesses are to survive, the service has to be provided by someone else, either as an add-on to their workload, or paid for by the business owner/budget holder, who is also paying the salary of the absent worker, often for months at a time on a regular basis.

IME cover for absent colleagues comes under the bit of a contract that says 'and all other duties as are operationally necessary' or similar, so become an obligation, despite contravening the other parts of the contract that cover hours and so on, so there is little wriggle room.

Policies on anti-discrimination and so on, whilst much needed and welcome, work in favour of the person who is absent. Often that is a good thing - who wants to see people unable to take time off when they are ill? But sometimes it is far from good for the people who repeatedly (and that word is the crux of the matter) expect others to pick up their slack.

I really don't need advice about the interface between unions, members and management, but thanks, all the same . I did a lot of training, and have a lot of experience in how that works in reality, as well as in theory. Your experience of a different workplace may be different, but I won't presume to comment on that, as just as you have no idea about the situation under which I operated, I don't know about yours.

Very nice for those working in a small business like that hairdressers. Now imagine scaling that up to huge organisations like the NHS.

I'm concerned about the potential risks of people, in the position you were in Doodledog, judging others when they don't fully understand what they're dealing with and can have no idea whether a colleague, or anyone else, was using mental illness as a means to avoid doing things they don't want to do and, presumably fooling the doctor who signed her off for all that time.

Many people with mental health conditions still manage to work and function in daily life - but beneath the surface, they might be facing significant struggles. It's often difficult for us to discern between someone who is genuinely able to manage their condition and those who might be pushing themselves too hard or masking their challenges.

Judging someone without knowing the specifics of their situation can be damaging and lead to feelings of shame and isolation. This can exacerbate their mental health issues rather than helping them. Presumably, rather than showing empathy and understanding, your assumptions and judgemental attitude could have worsened your colleagues mental health issues, and all based on extremely limited information on your part.

Yes, I am aware of all of that. Of course I am.

But you are ignoring the fact that someone without MH conditions can also be facing significant struggles and masking them, so are 'judged' as being able to cope.

Adding another workload to their own can (and does) push them to take on more and more, because of assumptions and attitudes like yours (which show them no empathy or understanding), can lead to broken relationships, burnout and ultimately to more MH issues across the board.

PS there is no need to be concerned about my professionalism. Whatever my own feelings (which are by no means skewed towards disbelief of those with MH issues - just the ones who take time off every time there is a difficult situation on the horizon), I could only work within the rules of the organisation and the laws of the land, even if I had wanted to do otherwise, which I didn't. I have no idea why you would suggest otherwise, but your comments are based on the extremely limited information you are choosing to take from my posts, which have reiterated to the point of tedium that I am not including the clinically ill in anything I am saying.

PoliticsNerd

I'm concerned about the potential risks of people, in the position you were in Doodledog, judging others when they don't fully understand what they're dealing with and can have no idea whether a colleague, or anyone else, was using mental illness as a means to avoid doing things they don't want to do and, presumably fooling the doctor who signed her off for all that time.

Many people with mental health conditions still manage to work and function in daily life - but beneath the surface, they might be facing significant struggles. It's often difficult for us to discern between someone who is genuinely able to manage their condition and those who might be pushing themselves too hard or masking their challenges.

Judging someone without knowing the specifics of their situation can be damaging and lead to feelings of shame and isolation. This can exacerbate their mental health issues rather than helping them. Presumably, rather than showing empathy and understanding, your assumptions and judgemental attitude could have worsened your colleagues mental health issues, and all based on extremely limited information on your part.

That is really harsh.. I don't see any sign of Doodledog being judgemental or lacking compassion.. she has been simply stating a how her work has been impacted.. She has not made any detrimental comments about her colleagues

One of the issues that is becoming slightly more prevalent as we are all getting older is very late onset schizophrenia or schizophrenia-like psychosis. Instead of getting the much more common dementia, there is a small but increasing number of elderly people getting this, with no previous history - which is worrying. This is a very serious mental illness (as opposed to just mental health) and results in the person experiencing a complete break from reality, in often some very serious episodes concerning persecution and extreme fear. It has been suggested that this could be due to the brain suffering mini-strokes or other types of damage in much older people. It means that very elderly people can be “sectioned” in a mental health hospital, which is not ideal for someone aged 90+. Initial treatment via A&E is quite a slow process as it takes a psychiatrist or two to be able to examine the patient - usually several days/weeks later due to sheer lack of available psychiatrists and then a wait of several weeks for a bed to become available in a MH hospital (the number of MH beds has reduced by about 70% in the last thirty years due to so-called “care in the community” - which is a big problem as the necessary treatment, antipsychotic medication, will not be accepted by the majority of patients initially, and so they have to be sectioned in order to force them to take it). A Deprivation of Liberty Order (DOLS) has to be quickly set up in a general hospital however this doesn’t include compulsory medication - which means other patients sharing a ward with a person suffering psychosis will be subject to the terrified shouts and screams of the affected patient, until finally the patient is seen.
The reduction of spending on mental health/mental illness is having a huge detrimental effect on all concerned and this should be addressed as a matter of urgency.

I don't think that in this case Doodledog is lacking in compassion, infact I think she has said several times over that she is very sympathetic towards people with ill mental health.
What I do read her saying here is that there is a price to pay in the work environment when some one sees it as acceptable to over burden their colleagues by self diagnosing some sort of mental condition that prevents them from working.
I would be very surprised if anyone's feelings were dismissed without offering some kind of consultation and support, whilst of course being mindful of the difficulties that come as a result of that person's decision.

This thread has fascinated me because I too was in the position that Doodledog describes where a colleague couldn’t cope with the challenges of the role.

She was higher up and more qualified than me but I ended up doing her job as well as my own (having to increase my part time hours accordingly) during long periods of sick leave.

When I eventually tackled the intolerable situation I was told You always flog the willing horse! So I left…and then there were none!

Thank you to those who can see what I am saying. It's like plaiting fog sometimes, so it's good to see that I'm not talking an alien language .

I’m another coming to support Doodledog’s contributions to this important, interesting discussion.
Pantglad2 is another coming in with her own experience of being ‘the willing horse’. You aren’t alone Pantglas, as this thread demonstrated.
A team I worked on brought in specialists to review case loads, work m stress, sickness etc, I was asked in my feedback session whether I was aware I was carrying colleagues who ‘weren’t coping’. No I didn’t know this. My manager had continued to load work and I’d continued to work much over my designated hours.
It’s well n good for PoliticsNerd to tell us we don’t all have the same abilities or coping mechanisms - like we don’t know that in this stage of our lives. We don’t all have the same sense of commitment or responsibility either. That’s the challenge isn’t it. Colleagues in private industry were quick to express frustration/irritation when the usual individuals failed to attend key meetings because they were off sick.

escaped

I don't think that in this case Doodledog is lacking in compassion, infact I think she has said several times over that she is very sympathetic towards people with ill mental health.
What I do read her saying here is that there is a price to pay in the work environment when some one sees it as acceptable to over burden their colleagues by self diagnosing some sort of mental condition that prevents them from working.
I would be very surprised if anyone's feelings were dismissed without offering some kind of consultation and support, whilst of course being mindful of the difficulties that come as a result of that person's decision.

I don't think that in this case Doodledog is lacking in compassion...

The very last thing that I would ever accuse Doodledog of, is lacking compassion.

Just want to make that clear!

Nobody has accused anyone of lacking compassion, as far as I can see. But let’s not worry about the truth; let’s instead go with opinions rather than facts."

They are facts to those that this happens to.

Another facet to this conversation, I think is to do with peoples willingness to perhaps risk their own wellbeing for the sake of a job.

Is it "only a job", or does someone think that if they can just get through the next day/week then it'll be better, they won't let anyone down, and they'll probably feel better by then.

To some, the idea of going to work when they're decidedly under the weather is ridiculous; to others, they wouldn't dream of going sick unless it's an absolute emergency.

Miss Adventure, I agree, and know personally that when I kept pushing myself to carry on it actually got worse and I eventually broke down.

My GP told me not to go back too quickly or I would relapse.

And yes, it was inconvenient for my colleagues and my manager.

It really isn’t as simple as it seems to others.

PoliticsNerd

Nobody has accused anyone of lacking compassion, as far as I can see. But let’s not worry about the truth; let’s instead go with opinions rather than facts."

Presumably, rather than showing empathy and understanding, your assumptions and judgemental attitude could have worsened your colleagues mental health issues, and all based on extremely limited information on your part. (PoliticsNerd)

Is the fact that you said this an opinion, or a fact?
In what way does the above differ from an accusation of lacking compassion? You have said that I don't show empathy and understanding, that my attitudes are judgemental and that they could have made things worse for the colleague whom you appear to have decided had mental health issues based on less information than was available to me.

Thank you to those who have been supportive. It is appreciated.

Yes, I was bought up to never mess work around.
Its how my mum and dad were, and they would have gone mad had I missed work, but now, I suppose I've seen how quickly people are replaced and forgotten.

All those years of absolute loyalty just taken for granted, I guess.

My thoughts on this is that there were times in my life I could have rather benefited from mental health support and for some reason I was too proud to ask. If we were to take a look at a terrifying statistics like suicide rates they tend to rise and fall with mental health data so I believe we are facing a very real issue. Perhaps people are self diagnosing through information found on the internet but are doctors and psychiatrists not doing the very same thing in educating themselves and making informed decisions? Would not anyone have to be suffering or struggling in some way to make such a search in the first place? I could very likely look at myself or someone else and say "that leg may be broken and needs medical attention". In the same way people are looking at their own mental health or the mental health of others and recognising the symptoms they display. We all are quite aware that we cannot tell someone to buck up and get over a broken leg. So allow them to seek medical attention or whatever lifestyle or routine that prevents them feeling life is too much altogether.

I guess it depends on circumstances too.
I looked on it that every day there were 10 employees relying on me to be there to "hold the fort", 80+ customers paying for that particular service, and most importantly 120 children relying on the adults to care for them. So I did drag myself into work when unwell or stressed beyond belief because people were counting on me, and I couldn't let them down. I was only human, I'm sure I probably compromised my own wellbeing and my own family suffered, but I couldn't bear to disappoint people by not delivering what was expected.
I know I'm only talking about a very small, privately run company here, and I'm not a martyr, but the greatest reward was that every single worker, unless in an absolute emergency, understood this attitude and wanted to follow it themselves. To this day I owe them a lot, but I often wonder how that would work in the modern world. Maybe not at all.

The other side of the coin MissAdventure. It's just as likely, especially if people are taking time off because it seems that things are becoming more than they can cope with. This is, of course, just another scenario; we still don't know the actual health of the 'colleague.'

I've watched someone attempt to work through depression, visiting a psychiatrist at times that wouldn't raise any questions, and still perceived as doing a brilliant job. The challenges ultimately caused them to experience a paranoid episode - something you really wouldnt wish on any one - that led to a swift ambulance ride to the hospital. Later it needed ECT, since none of the treatments they had undergone had pulled them back from the depths.

I will always hope that groups of co-workers don't undermine someone who has done the difficult thing in opening up about their challenges.

I always felt I HAD to go to work because I was doing some particular paperwork, or I'd promised to take a service user somewhere, or a multitude of other reasons.

On the whole, my colleagues were of a similar mindset, so it worked out even handedly.

I couldnt relax if I'd taken a day off, anyway, because I'd have felt guilty, even if I was ill. (,physically or emotionally)

Perhaps those days are gone, though?

I suppose it means having a lot of trust in your "team members", PoliticsNerd.
That probably comes from getting to know someone's values and standards, and attitude over years, perhaps?

I would hope that if I'd explained to a colleague that I was struggling, they'd know I was being truthful.