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Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

• jamiemac2005 9y ago
  I found it interesting that the article mentioned their product so much. But, if this is genuinely how they treat mental health; they deserve all the free marketing they may get.
• zitterbewegung 9y ago
  I applaud the author for destigmatizing mental health issues. More companies need to be like this. Its really hard for people to understand mental health issues because you have to take many optional classes to even get an idea of what they are. Also, many people throw around terms like psychopath / ADD(ADHD) and either diagnose themselves or others and that can lead to more stigma or even misunderstandings. I think better education of mental health would help solve this.
  • sharkweek 9y ago
    I suffer with OCD - and I mostly let it go when people say "I'm so OCD" about needing something organized, or wanting something cleaned, etc. But I do try and educate others on what OCD actually does to people like myself when the opportunity presents itself as it's definitely one of the most misunderstood disorders. It can easily ruin a day/week for me if I let the intrusive thoughts take over. Anyone interested, take a read through the "symptoms" here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsessive%E2%80%93compulsive_disorder#Signs_and_symptoms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsessive%E2%80%93compulsive_d...
    • stordoff 9y ago
      I just want to highlight one line from that article that is easy to overlook: > People with OCD understand that their notions do not correspond with reality It's like having two thought processes running simultaneously - there's one set that is exactly how I was pre-OCD, and there's another that is _constantly_ trying to inject the various obsessions and compulsions. It's really disconcerting to have thoughts that don't really feel like your own thoughts, recognise them as dumb and irrational, yet end up acting on them anyway.
  • acuozzo 9y ago
    > Also, many people throw around terms like psychopath / ADD(ADHD) I can't stand this because I suffer from a double whammy: true diagnosed comorbid ADHD and OCD which people assume means that I'm just really hyper and picky. Also, people nowadays tend to assume that I was self-diagnosed (I wasn't) which I find to be a rather disrespectful and demeaning assumption. Living with ADHD and OCD as a computer programmer is a daily struggle. I have to constantly stop myself from getting hyper-focused on problems unrelated to my job and stop myself from needlessly spending hours getting meaningless details just right. These distractions negatively impact my productivity, so I'm thankful everyday that I've accumulated enough smarts over the years to make up for it with what I produce. It sucks having to fight yourself everyday in order to live some semblance of a normal life and it really sucks when people minimize your problems by adopting them as monikers for quirky personality traits.
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    • danellis 9y ago
      > Living with ADHD and OCD as a computer programmer is a daily struggle. I've struggled with this for as long as I remember, but I didn't really understand what was wrong with me until I was diagnosed a couple of years ago after having a particularly difficult time. I was as open with my manager about it as I felt I could be, and they gave the impression of being supportive. When I got a new manager, I laid it all out (which my therapist encouraged me to do), and explained how I was trying new medications and that some of them had negatively affected me. He said he understood and that he'd make sure I got the support I needed. When review time came, he said things hadn't been perfect, but he considered that to be because I hadn't received the appropriate support from my previous manager. Things improved: he made sure I was assigned longer-term work that didn't involve having to switch between tasks too often. Unfortunately, everything I'd done suddenly became irrelevant when they decided to reboot a project, invalidating nine months of work. Then one day, out of the blue, just as I was getting into the restarted project, I was called into a Hangout and told that that would be my last day, with no formal explanation given, other than that they were suddenly no longer happy with the quality of my work. I was devastated. My son had just started at a private school (because of his own problems with ADHD), and I was due to lease a new car later that day. We ended up homeschooling him for the rest of the year. What really gets to me, though, is that there was no process. The VP of People had given a talk not longer before about "How to get fired from <company>", and one of the key takeaways was that no one should be fired without knowing it was coming, but for some reason I was treated differently. And all this from a company that preaches "love" as a core value. I'm not naive: I understand that it's all about the bottom line, not caring about people, but this was a company that wanted us to believe it cared about things like mental health. I've learned my lesson, though. In future, I'll keep personal things to myself, and just try to do my best. I've learned not to think of colleagues as friends, and I will never again fill out a self-assessment except in the blandest, most generic of terms.
• deleted 9y ago
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• xname2 9y ago
  Can someone please explain to me what is special with 2017?
  • oddeyed 9y ago
    I think they are just disappointed that things hadn't improved by now.
  • becausewat 9y ago
    I would say it's common to use the phrase "It's <current_year> and..." when describing something that one finds appalling in modern society.
    • xname2 9y ago
      But how about "It's 2017 and 1+1 is still 2?"?
      • PeterisP 9y ago
        The message is quite different. I read your comment as saying essentially "ok, it's business as usual, and hasn't yet changed", i.e., acknowledging a fact, and possibly acknowledging that it's likely to continue in the future (which is true). I read their message as saying the same as you say, but also stating a value judgment - i.e. that it should be considered weird that hasn't changed, that it should have been changed ages ago (definitely before 2017), and that it should be considered unacceptable if it continues in the future. Which is quite a different story about the same facts, and this part of the story is efficiently implied by the short prefix "It's 2017 but..".
  • AndrewKemendo 9y ago
    It's a way to signal incredulity with something being an issue which you think shouldn't still be an issue. https://encyclopediadramatica.rs/The_Current_Year https://encyclopediadramatica.rs/The_Current_Year
    • 9y ago
• steven777400 9y ago
  Great article. A few years ago (at a previous job) I took a sick day for "sanity", but told them I wasn't feeling well. I felt guilty about doing it. I think part of it is the association of sick leave with externally visible medical issues, and the corresponding "straightforward" medical verification. In other words, if you have a temperature or are vomiting, that's obvious. Many infections or physical injury can be trivially verified by a doctor. But a "sanity day", as truthful and necessary as it might be, is neither of those. Out of curiosity, I checked my current employment contract. It says sick leave is for "A personal illness, injury or medical disability that prevents the employee from performing his or her job, or personal medical or dental appointments." or "Exposure of the employee to contagious disease when attendance at work would jeopardize the health of others." There's a dozen or so other cases listed in the contract, mostly about allowing sick leave to care for sick family members/children. Our contract also allows for verification, "If the Employer suspects abuse, the Employer may require a written medical certificate for any sick leave absence." I've never heard of anyone here being asked for a verification, but it would tend to discourage people doing the "sanity day" sort of thing.
  • calafrax 9y ago
    Medically speaking a mental illness is no different than a physical illness. Mental illness does not have to be severe just as physical illness does not have to be severe. Sick leave policies typically only require a doctors note/visit if you are absent for multiple days. Taking a single day off for mild mental illness, something like elevated stress levels causing anxiety that interrupts your sleep, seems perfectly consistent with most of the corporate sick leave policies I have read.
    • wu-ikkyu 9y ago
      >Medically speaking a mental illness is no different than a physical illness. I am a proponent of taking time off for mental health, but I have to nitpick here. Medically speaking, physical illness is different from mental illness. One is diagnosed from objective scientific tests (pathology) while the other is not.
• BadassFractal 9y ago
  First hand experience. As a founder it's terrifying to let people know that you are experiencing debilitating levels of burnout, anxiety and moderate depression that prevent you from being effective at your job. There are days when you're just sitting there staring at your screen for 10 hours hoping nobody can tell you're checked out. You put on a smile, try to follow the usual routine as a robot, and secretly go to your therapist to try to fix it before someone catches on. I was lucky therapy got me out of it, or at least mostly smoothed it out, in under 6 months.
  • maxxxxx 9y ago
    As a founder you could also set a positive example and say "I can't get anything done today" and take a break. Fixed working hours are one of the biggest problems in a profession like software engineering. On some days you just can't get anything done. It would be better to just take the day off and come back fresh the next day instead of sitting around and pretending that you are working.
    • lloeki 9y ago
      Aaaand... over here we just received formal notice (very informally worded) that mandates us to work for certain durations and be present at specified times, and required to log this by any means we see fit, full log being due to management each month. This kind of attitude just sends the wrong message, devaluates everyone's work by subsuming it to mere tallies, and just outright crosses everyone, obliterating trust and turning it into a culture of fear. Turns out quite a bunch of us aren't efficient at all before 10AM because that's how our circadian rhythm is, yet it's viewed as laziness to come mere five minutes late as we're supposed to show up at least an hour earlier, preferably two. Net result, actual work is hardly done during this forced downtime, and reluctantly so afterwards. Everyone is just pretending to comply in order to bridge the impedance mismatch. As a result, everyone gets increasingly tired fighting their natural rhythm, and slowly growing bitter with each day passing as we witness ourselves wasting everyone's time. Software development and engineering is a highly mental, creative process. We are not laying bricks 8 hours a day, we have to find and build new solutions to new problems, one by one. This process cannot be shifted, sliced, rearranged at will because it's not mindless, numbing, robot work.
• nolepointer 9y ago
  While I agree with the author's argument, stating the current year does not advance it. Seriously, it's even a meme.
  • urethrafranklin 9y ago
    http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-on-its-2015-current-year http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-on-its-2015-current-year
    • deleted 9y ago
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• deleted 9y ago
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• alexashka 9y ago
  It's not controversial, there's even a term for it - airing dirty laundry. People don't talk about it because they don't want to all of a sudden be treated differently because 'mental health', and now people around you are walking on egg-shells or being fake supportive. Why can't it just be a personality thing - some people need time alone more than others, for whatever reason that is. When you start labelling it mental health, all you're doing is self-diagnosing yourself into a hole that's hard to get out of. Unless you have debilitating problems of course, in which case the employer should know from day 1.
  • tetrep 9y ago
    > Why can't it just be a personality thing... For the same reason a cold isn't "just my body." Just like a virus can put your body in a bad state, so too can various stimuli to your mind. You don't just chalk it up to "how things are", you attempt to resolve it. For a cold, your body does that on it's own and you mostly just wait it out. Mental health issues can be similar (I'm just feeling off today), or they might require some effort on the part of the sick person to resolve. Either way, you don't treat it as a personality quirk, as that undermines the severity of the issue (it really is a health issue) and implicitly shifts the blame to the person who is sick[0]. > When you start labelling it mental health, all you're doing is self-diagnosing yourself... I don't see it as any different than self-diagnosing your cold as a physical ailment. Sometimes people are not capable to doing meaningful work due to their mental state, and people should feel comfortable saying that they need a sick day for their mental health. [0]: Which, it could be their fault. But ideally we want to describe issues without implying blame. But just like you could unable to work due to a hangover, you could knowingly put yourself into a scenario that you know (or should know) will put you in a bad mental state. Edit: Forgot the dirty laundry quote. I want to comment on that too. > It's not controversial, there's even a term for it - airing dirty laundry. Airing dirty laundry is providing "too much information", saying "I need a sick day for mental health" doesn't strike me as an inappropriate amount of detail anymore than "I need a sick day for physical health". I suppose you could shorten it to "I need a sick day" if knowing any more information is too much.
    • alexashka 9y ago
• goodroot 9y ago
  My partner works at Olark. It truly is a human-focused business. I love that she is there. The intention that their team and leadership have applied into creating a safe environment is deeply rooted and honest. As someone who struggled with depression for two decades, while ultimately thwarted, it was a hopeless, numbing plague. As a coping mechanism, I developed my career working remotely. I was unable to function within a typical office environment. At home I could steal away to my bedroom and hide from the black under cover of blanket, when I needed to. It's encouraging to see the silent struggle find words and champions. May others who are going through the darkness find supportive and loving environments; any change to find them is worth it. You are the author of your journey and the hero: write a happy story.
  • DrScump 9y ago
    My partner works at Olark. It truly is a human-focused business. Perhaps that explains the lack of openings on their jobs page?
• misterAxiom 9y ago
  I've found that "mental health" is little more than the APA trying to bully people. The APA is a joke because it views "you're depressed" as a scientific statement of fact rather than a way of bullying people. The reality is that it is ALWAYS bullies who bring up mental health. As soon as the subject of mental health comes up, people start acting like professional wrestlers because they know there is no response to the accusation, "you're crazy". So people act like stupid jerks who are putting on a show for ten year olds. They're both afraid of being called "crazy". Just look at how awful people are when someone's mental health is questioned. Constitutional rights are flushed down the toilet and the accused is treated like a murderer. What psychologists and psychoanalysts discovered is that you can bully people to the point where their family will pay for "therapy". Now, this "therapy" is little more than a chance for a professional bully to criticize your life. This bully, a "mental health professional", just wants more money. This bully will say anything in order to get you to keep coming back. This bully will ask about your dreams. This bully will tell you he knows what your dreams mean. It is a scam, and the bullies who claim others lack "mental health" are parasites. If you do research, you will find that other cultures consider western-style mental health a scam. Furthermore, it is impossible not to notice that an extraordinarily high number of veterans have "mental health issues". This is done to cover up the fact that a veteran is someone who has said, "I want to die for my country" but is no longer wanted for active service by their country. In other words, a veteran is a suicidal individual who is denied the chance to commit suicide through service. The "mental health" industry covers up this rather awkward situation by saying the soldier lacks "mental health" when in reality the society simply doesn't know what to do with him...after the society has given him the opportunity to say "I would rather die for all of you than live in your society as an ordinary citizen". Society: DIE FOR US! Soldier: OK, SIGN ME UP! Society: NO, STOP IT! Soldier: ??? The solution to this: put a bullet in the head of anyone who says "I want to die for my country". Genocide. Get rid of them. Don't let them cause trouble. Don't let weeds grow in your garden. You want to die for your country? I'll kill you with my bare hands.
• sauronlord 9y ago
  "Mental Illnesses" are non-scientific and non-falsifiable. See for a jump off point for your research: https://www.cchrint.org/psychiatric-disorders/no-medical-tests-exist/ https://www.cchrint.org/psychiatric-disorders/no-medical-tes... No progress will be made because there is nothing objective to measure or improve. A Cult of Mental Illness has more in common with religion than medicine. Furthermore. There is no "Mental" vs. "Physical". It is just one unit. Dualism is a construction of language and not objectively "there". Imagine if the author just said: "I'm taking a day off for my health". It would take on a different meaning but be completely equivalent in content and objective. Then we could write an article about how "physical health" is stimatized.
• deleted 9y ago
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• DonbunEf7 9y ago
  I couldn't afford to do this. My mental illness is sufficiently severe that I need months, not days, to unpack and unwind, and I haven't felt not-burnt-out in about half a decade. I only get to do this between jobs. I'm glad that this situation worked out alright for the employee, but there often isn't enough sick leave available.
  • xname2 9y ago
    Is it possible to find a less demanding (also less payment) job? Would this help?
  • mistermann 9y ago
    That said, I suspect in many cases for any given individual person, there very well likely may be "a" solution out there that would work for them, perhaps not as a "cure", but as a way to manage. The big problem is, in most places it is incredibly difficult to get in to see a mental health professional, but even worse than that, many of the successful approaches for managing mental health (spirituality & meditation, alternative nootropic supplements) are not conducive to traditional "scientific" study, and are even considered outright quackery by many (and many of them are by my reckoning, but then it depends how you look at it). To find such approaches, you have to do a lot of personal investigation, reading forums, talking to people, etc. My suspicion is that formal mental health practitioners would rather you came in for regular, recurring one hour sessions for years, rather than pointing you in this direction. But that may just be the cynic in me.
  • rnprince 9y ago
    Does FMLA leave apply for cases like yours?
    • thedaemon 9y ago
      From personal experience, it does not.
  • macspoofing 9y ago
    That's a good point. It's trivial for almost any company to accommodate a 'mental health' sick day here or there - in fact nobody cares what you take a sick day for. So the situation in the blog post is a bit contrived and the boss pats himself a bit too much on the back for his response. I would think true mental health accommodation would involve long periods of leave, or limited hours, or limited days (e.g. 3 day work-weeks) or all of the above. Not many businesses are setup for that.
• techdom 9y ago
  >it's the (((current year)))
  • Dirlewanger 9y ago
    Seriously, I wish this bullshit meme strawman would die.
• techdom 9y ago
  >it's the (((current year)))
• curun1r 9y ago
  My only issue with this is how he seems to lump in the "mental health" days that people without diagnosed mental health disorders face with the stigmatization that the other group feels. I fully support people who need to deal with mental fatigue in these ways, but if just taking time off "cures" your mental health issues, it's a different class of problem from what others are dealing with. The "still" is incredibly premature when it comes to mental health in the workplace. We're just scratching the surface when it comes to acknowledging, accepting and understanding those with mental health disorders. Depression, ADHD and even Autism Spectrum and OCD are all on the leading edge of disorders that are receiving less stigmatization and more acceptance over time. But there's a lot more in the DSM-V that are completely misunderstood or completely unpublicized. And our workplaces are completely unprepared to deal with them. I saw this first hand at my previous employer. We had a coworker who had a number of personal disagreements with other coworkers. In discussing it with my mother, a psychologist, she mentioned that much of his behavior sounded, to her, like someone with Borderline Personality Disorder. He was everyone's best friend up until they did anything he interpreted as being against him at which point he'd flip and try to sabotage them at every opportunity, including filing numerous baseless claims with HR. The organization was completely unprepared to deal with an individual like him. Each HR claim he filed was treated seriously, but there was never encouragement or a requirement that he talk to a trained mental health professional who could have been helped guide the company to a productive outcome. Instead, his conflicts with other employees caused at least 3 of them to quit before he was eventually forced out of the company for taking on someone who had too much pull with upper management. I can only imagine the carnage that would have been caused if he had been a she and had been able to abuse the sexual harassment policies. HR is only trained to help the company avoid getting sued. But there's damage to both the employee and the company that can happen without the lawyers getting involved. The company's HR failed him and the rest of us that had to work with him by not knowing how to deal with that sort of psychological disorder. Rather than "it's 2017 and mental health is still an issue," I'd say, "it's 2017 and we're finally starting to acknowledge the long road ahead of us."
  • aaron-lebo 9y ago
    You are very very right. When people have disorders like you list they are disabling. That's expensive for the worker and the employer and ultimately our social systems but it's just kind of expected that those people are forgotten with no resources but their own to cope. That's a horrible broken system. What scares me is the undiagnosed (as you pointed out). There's way too many people in public perception that when analyzed closely have some kind of personality disorder. Not to play psychobabble but way too often these disorders are recognized for the success they provide but the destructive aspects are ignored. Some of these people have been so successful that they'll die untreated and it's a loss for them and everyone else. Jobs had something wrong with him that he appears to have recognized and mitigated over time. Trump has something wrong with him, he'll never get treated. There are some other popular figures that are less controversial but in the same boat. Straight up sociopathic behavior that is applauded until enough people get hurt. Then you've got the unsuccessful delusional people who end up committing mass murder. How many shootings and terrorist attacks could have been prevented through relatively cheap mental healthcare? It seems like an obvious weak point in society that we don't really address. Worse, you gotta wonder if social media is exacerbating it in some people. It's easy to become a delusional narcissist these days. Maybe it always has been?
• xname2 9y ago
  Shouldn't vacation days be used to help your mental health? If vacation days are not enough, there might be a more serious problem ...
  • novia 9y ago
    If you're getting ready for work in the morning and you're suddenly hit with an overwhelming panic attack and you feel afraid to leave your house, that doesn't leave much time to request the day off to use for vacation. Most people will judge you if you call in and say "I am experiencing extreme anxiety this morning and I'm afraid of leaving the house, so I won't be coming in today." So instead you shoot your coworkers/boss an email or a text that says "Hey, I'm not feeling well today. I don't want to get you guys sick!" Because that makes you seem caring and thoughtful instead of a weak coward who can't handle the stress of real life. Even people with "serious problems" have to pay the bills. *Edit: I just realized that when you said there might be a more serious problem you might have meant that the employer is not offering enough vacation days. If that is what you meant, then I'm sorry for unfairly maligning you with my last line.
    • xname2 9y ago
      No. When I said "serious problem" I meant the patient. Yes, people need to pay bills, but it is not your employer's responsibility.
  • pertymcpert 9y ago
    Why?
• cryoshon 9y ago
  first off, good for madalyn, it takes too much courage to introduce specifics regarding any kind of sick time and mental health is especially burdensome. now, moving on to the rest of the post: of course it's still an issue. taking sick time for any reason is still an issue. everyone feels the pressure to not be sick, to not take sick time, and to work while sick. i have never worked for any organization where this was not the case-- even in some good places that were good to their workers-- and have only escaped it by working for myself. >It’s 2017. I cannot believe that it is still controversial to speak about mental health in the workplace when 1 in 6 americans are medicated for mental health. you see, mental health is more of a threat than "physical" health. you get better from having a cold. you sniffle through a few days of work, maybe take a day at home, then sniffle through another day or two, and the lost productivity stops. the spectre of mental health is that it is a long term sap on an employee's productivity that will also have flare-ups which result in time taken off, total work stoppage, malingering, unreliability, and bad morale. and it can't really be "cured" just treated. it's the profit seeking organization's nightmare. they'd never hire someone mentally ill, if they could reliably avoid being sued for their discrimination. >It’s 2017. I cannot believe that it is still controversial to offer paid sick leave. only in the blisteringly backwards and proudly ignorant USA is it controversial. we are far behind the rest of the world when it comes to labor rights and treating people like human beings. elsewhere the issue is settled definitively. to be blunt the CEOs haven't done their part in fighting for this basic right, nor has the government, nor have the workers. everyone has too much to lose by being the one to push, so nobody pushes. >Our jobs require us to execute at peak mental performance. When an athlete is injured they sit on the bench and recover. Let’s get rid of the idea that somehow the brain is different. the difference is that an athlete ages out of being competitive after a time, and so their profit-driven self-infliction of injury ends earlier. workers are stressed by work for most of their lives, for most of the hours of their waking day. work is far more detrimental to people's brains than being an athlete is to the body. oh yeah, and workers can't choose when to stop, unless they want to choose to stop eating too. to be blunt there's no way that american workers could possibly operate at peak mental performance with their mental scaffolding so occupied with maintaining job security. this causes mental illness too, of course. name a bigger stressor for people than their jobs / money. >Take some time this week to express gratitude to individuals on your team. You might be surprised at the positive impact. this is a bare minimum, not part of any solution. the real solution (which won't be implemented because it is expensive) is to have an iron law in your corporation that your employees must take X paid sick days per year or per month. it's that simple. then it won't be an issue, because it'll be a policy that people are forced to follow. there's no guilt about taking sick days for any health reason at that point. nobody feels like they're being dead weight when they take a sick day. >Take some time to reflect on how your company’s values help create a safe-space for your teammates  this is more likely to be lip service or self-deception at most companies than it is a reality. most companies value profit, and act accordingly when that value contradicts the health of their employees because their employees are replaceable. >1 in 6 of whom is likely medicated for a mental health issue. this should tell us that our society is violently unhealthy for our minds, as is our work culture. and they are.
• throwaway2928 9y ago
  Not that long ago, I was considering joining a startup where an old manager of mine was the head of eng. They seemed to be doing some cool stuff, another friend had recently joined and spoke well of it, and I thought I'd give it a go. As part of that process, my old manager took me out for coffee to talk about the company, etc. When we chatted, he basically laid down that he was concerned- when I had worked for him, I'd been depressed. He wanted to protect his startup from that kind of attitude. So there I was jumping through hoops to assure him that I had gotten therapy, that I was keeping an eye on it, on and on... only afterwards did I realize how fucked up that was. Yes, he's got a right to try to protect a fragile young startup. But on the other hand, he's doing it via discrimination due to health issues. In the end, I also realized something else that mattered: I was always feeling like shit those days that I worked for him in large part because of how he ran things. After he left, we got a much better manager who honestly seemed to work hard to make me happy. Why the hell would I want to go work for that guy again in the first place?
  • phil21 9y ago
    This is where it gets tricky. Is your negative attitude due to a medical condition or you just being an asshole who has an attitude problem? And is that even material to the decision to hire you or not? No one really cares why you act like that, they simply care that you do. I'm going to say it's entirely on you to present yourself in a positive light at work, and I honestly think your ex-manager was doing you a solid there. The typical way this plays out is your mental condition (or possibility of one) gets discussed by management behind closed doors and you never know why you didn't receive that offer or promotion. And yes, based on my limited experience with larger companies this is exceedingly common at the executive level. The one thing you don't want on your "record" is a history of mental health issues - there is no recovery to your (management) career once that is known. In your case I think you simply had the curtain pulled back a little, out of consideration from your past manager. Your other points stand though.
    • throwaway2928 9y ago
      > Is your negative attitude due to a medical condition or you just being an asshole who has an attitude problem? I'm always unsure. These days, I'm generally a pretty positive guy but I know I've struggled in the past. On this particular team I was definitely not the biggest asshole. In fact, after this manager left, the biggest asshole was fired pretty much based on the fact that the new managers weren't willing to tolerate his attitude. The bro culture of the team was curtailed (which is why I was so much happier on it afterwards). It's very hard to be a manager, a people leader. I don't think he was wrong to bring up the fact - he was doing it because he wanted to protect his company - but it certainly danced around a line of legality. After I withdrew my application he made sure to tell friends of mine that he had rejected me because of my depression. Really mature, that guy is.
• siliconc0w 9y ago
  There is a kinda secret code for OOO or WFH emails that managers should respect. Definitely got to "Respect the code" (say in a pirate voice). As a manager I'd write purposely vague emails to contribute to this, "Sorry will be late, got jumped by a gang of ninjas" because I really don't like to set a cultural tone that isn't trusting of employees. I basically need to know you aren't going to be here but I don't need to know why. There was an eng manager that would pester people about vaguer emails asking for clarification. I really wanted to just sit him down and explain that he isn't being clever and he was basically being a jackass for prying into people's personal lives - vague email is vague for a reason.
  • lazyasciiart 9y ago
    I decided years ago to avoid detail in "I'm sick" emails, because I don't want to one day think "do I need to say I have horrendous diarrhea, or can i just say I'm sick?"
    • siliconc0w 9y ago
      It's kinda an all or nothing situation. If the habit is to usually provide detail and then one day someone doesn't - people will assume the worst. Thus, it's better to encourage less info than more. Which is a bit counter-intuitive because, ideally, people genuinely feel bad about missing work and want to provide some justification.
    • draw_down 9y ago
      Me too, I also used to say "I have an appointment on Thursdays" instead of telling people I was going to the shrink. Though I'm guessing that code was not exactly impenetrable.
      • Jaruzel 9y ago
        I did exactly the same when I was in therapy the time before last. The only person who knew where I actually was, was my Manager (and I guess HR as well) - but my team (peers and subordinates) didn't know. I felt at the time this was the correct way to handle it. Third time around in therapy (last year), I decided to be very open about my mental health, and the steps I was taking to help myself. So my emails became 'I can't do that then, I'm in therapy.'. I found personally, that being honest and open to everyone about my problems actually contributed in a small way to my recovery effort. Even now, stabilised and medicated, I'm still honest and open about my [ongoing] journey, and who I was as person then, and who I am now. I am never going to lie about being crazy again, it's not healthy.
• wu-ikkyu 9y ago
  >We are in a knowledge economy. Our jobs require us to execute at peak mental performance. When an athlete is injured they sit on the bench and recover. Let’s get rid of the idea that somehow the brain is different.
• j05huaNathaniel 9y ago
  Honestly, kind of sounds like the work she does may be the reason for the mental health issues. Maybe find a job that doesn't depress the shit out of you? I know, easier said than done.
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  • 086421357909764 9y ago
    So a remote work office that you rent? Also, that email alone screams questionable to me.
• saghul 9y ago
  Very nice article, thanks for sharing! It reminded me of this one, written by my coworker Tyler: https://medium.com/smells-like-team-spirit/teamwork-and-mental-illness-in-the-workplace-302014e0ba96 https://medium.com/smells-like-team-spirit/teamwork-and-ment...
• BucketSort 9y ago
  Isn't it always the primary issue?
• neap24 9y ago
  I don't understand. Why isn't it standard practice to just issue a set of "personal days" without regard to "sickness", "leisure", or "mental sanity"? My company switched to this a couple of years ago and doesn't require an explanation. They are your days off, take them as you see fit.
  • mrkrab 9y ago
    Isn't that called "holidays"? We have one month every year by law here. But of course you have to negotiate when they are with your employer.
  • e40 9y ago
    It is for a lot of companies. It's called "PTO" or Paid Time Off.
  • djhworld 9y ago
    It's strange to have that allowance laid out as a fixed number up front. Most of my jobs in my career have offered 25-30 days paid holiday, plus the 8 or so days of public holidays, and paid sick leave. That way you don't fall into a trap of debating whether you should use your last allotted "personal day" on something you might thing isn't worth taking it for as you might need it later.
• timwaagh 9y ago
  Sure if people like you you can get away with even a month of being 'sick' but its really depends on the person. At a company i worked there was a guy who did that. He got away with it but he was a very senior programmer. If i tried this i would have to worry about them using it as grounds for a firing.
• sneak 9y ago
  My grandfather taught me well: one should never, ever talk about their health unless it's good.
  • deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  • mmagin 9y ago
    At least as long as we live in a society that is always pushing competition as a primary virtue, you may be right.
  • quickthrower 9y ago
    And a woman's place is in the home, no doubt.
• nvahalik 9y ago
  I don't get this whole thing. Whatever happened to talking to your superiors about this kinda stuff? I've taken plenty of "sick" (of this job) days over the years and often times would proactively tell people to stay home if they were killing themselves (even locking out their accounts, if they went home and tried to work). This had nothing to do with "mental health" it was just part of keeping people happy and not letting their work dictate their lives.
  • rifung 9y ago
    I'm bipolar and personally I would be afraid to tell my manager about it because there's still a great amount of social stigma.
  • deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
• cgoodmac 9y ago
  What do people do when they take a couple days off for mental health? I love the idea, but have no idea what I'd do.
  • quickthrower 9y ago
    It'll depend on the issue. Maybe see a counselor, talk to a friend, get into nature or hide in bed.
  • deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  • wccrawford 9y ago
    Find something that lets you relax and de-stress. For me, it's video games. A good video game relaxes me like nothing else. Of course, that depends on there being a good video game that I haven't already played out. Books can also do it for me, to a lesser extent. I also have other hobbies, mostly involving creating things like papercraft or models, that will help de-stress me. The worst is when I spend too much time playing games and start to feel guilty about not doing other things. It's a downward spiral because the thing that relaxes me is now causing me additional stress. The real solution is, of course, to find the real stress and reduce it directly. That's not always possible, but there's usually something that can be done.
• ninjakeyboard 9y ago
  I think taking downtime is good. I sort of wonder if actually affect my mental health by not working though.
• chris123 9y ago
  I don't think it's likely that a day will come, at least in our lifetimes, where workplaces are free from mental health issues. Yes, that would be great, but it's about as realistic as having colds and flus not be an issue in the workplace. These things are not going away in our lifetimes.
  • droopyEyelids 9y ago
    I'd actually go further and predict mental health will continue to be an issue, even outside the workplace. I'm not even certain a just, enlightened society would require people with mental disorders to work in an office!
  • catmanjan 9y ago
    Even people on the Enterprise had mental health issues, I think it's part of being human.
• luvandp3ace 9y ago
  I have trouble understanding this. You work in an organization, they have goals, priorities. You have a role and responsibility. Since when was it a company responsibility to take care of your mental well-being? If you need some time off to work on it, shouldn't you just take some time off? Am I missing something?
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• makecheck 9y ago
  One of the big problems with mental health is that it’s aggravated by bruising that you can’t see. If someone came up to you and gave you a paper cut every day for the next 3 years, you’d show some major scars and there would certainly be enough evidence to gain some sympathy. All the interactions you have in your day can also have a cumulative effect on the mind. We can have laws or corporate rules or whatever but at the end of the day people just have to stop being so lousy to one another. Obviously this means there shouldn’t be people screaming at each other but it’s a lot more than that. It’s also the little things: don’t cut in lines, don’t be a jerk in traffic, don’t eat stinky meals in the middle of crowds, don’t get in peoples’ way or be generally oblivious to what’s around you, etc. These are all the “paper cuts” of the mind, gradually aggravating people day after day until they just can’t handle it anymore.
  • johnfn 9y ago
    I say this with as much compassion as possible (though it's going to be hard to sound that way over the Internet). A lot of those aggravations are more perceived than actual, thanks to the mental illness itself. You could say "how's it going, buddy" to a depressed and a non-depressed person, and the non-depressed person could see it as a genuine and caring remark and the depressed person could see it as sarcastic or uncaring or whatever. A depressed person could see someone cutting lanes as a jerk, a non-depressed person may see them as in a rush and busy. Depression is something that colors the entire world dark and gray. It turns a bunch of normal remarks into thousands of little papercuts. No one is right or wrong here, but for a depressed person, understanding how depression colors the world can be useful.
  • Broken_Hippo 9y ago
    "If someone came up to you and gave you a paper cut every day for the next 3 years, you’d show some major scars and there would certainly be enough evidence to gain some sympathy." Actually, I think folks would talk behind your back and wonder why you put up with the abuse - but they'll generally stay out of it. If you are lucky, they'll call the cops for a checkup. If you give yourself paper cuts, folks will still talk about you. A few will offer an ear if you need to talk. And some folks will decide to shower you with complements so you stop ruining your body with scars. Unfortunately, mental health is more horrid than that. It is like watching everyone get a papercut and go on with life, while it cripples you for a day.
• gerbilly 9y ago
  While it's great that we are discussing this topic, my first reaction is: why does a worker even need an excuse? Isn't it a bit odd that companies who otherwise trust employees with business critical matters, sometimes matters of life and death even, won't trust them to be mature enough to decide when they need to take time off? When I was in grade 7, me and this girl Elissa were seated at the back of the class. We had the kind of desks where you had to lift up the top to get at your books. We were lifting the tops up to hide behind them while 'secretly' telling each other stupid jokes and giggling. In retrospect, the teacher definitely knew what we were doing but he probably figured since we were generally good kids he'd just let us get away with it and have a bit of fun.
• quickthrower 9y ago
  It's one thing taking a day off for mental health, but what if the job itself is contributing to said mental health problem? For example being bullied or having unreasonable expectations with some kind of negative reinforcement loop. Certainly doesn't sound like the case at the company in the article. But that CEO sounds exceptional. We also need to address treating employees as humans not workproduct producing AWS instances.
• taurath 9y ago
  Heh. If you're a contractor in a lot of places you don't get sick time or days off either - you get to put a direct dollar cost on "taking a day off".
• deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
• sgt 9y ago
  "1 in 6 americans are medicated for mental health." - that is very high. What's causing Americans to have so many mental health issues? I don't have the stats, but I cannot easily believe that this would the case in let's say Europe.
  • etrevino 9y ago
    According to [this Guardian article](https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/sep/05/third-europeans-mental-disorder https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/sep/05/third-europe...), a very large number of folks in Europe suffer as well. Less are treated, however. * The study referenced also includes neurological disorders, so we do need to be careful with the article's interpretation.
  • etrevino 9y ago
    Did some more research. According to the EU [1] 27.4% of the population suffered from a mental disorder in the past year. It would not surprise me to hear that two-thirds or so of those were medicated, though I haven't actually found any numbers. [1] http://ec.europa.eu/health/archive/ph_determinants/life_style/mental/green_paper/mental_gp_en.pdf http://ec.europa.eu/health/archive/ph_determinants/life_styl...
  • rf15 9y ago
    Remember that getting medication doesn't necessarily mean that there's actually something wrong with you when prescribing medications has a positive effect on your doctor's income.
    • usernam 9y ago
      Indeed, the number seems disproportionate. But it can be possible depending on the definition of "medication". I'd expect the number of mental health issues with an underlying [known] physiological nature (say, bipolar, schizophrenia), and thus mediated with the proper treatment to be _very_ low. Mental health issues resulting from workspace, work, stress and in general lifestyle issues can still be medicated to help recovery, though the proper solution would obviously be a change in lifestyle. I've witnessed many people with depression. I can only speak for relatives for which I know the full story. When faced with the issue, at least here, you have two choices. The psychologist will talk you into a lifestyle change whenever possible. Going to a psychologist is still considered medication here, and it's covered by national health. When going to a psychiatrist instead, the medication (chemical) is almost always guaranteed. It's helpful to say though that no amount of medication fixes mental health issues related to workplace issues if the underlying cause is not removed. This is a very dramatic issue, as for some people with limited working experience (and thus unable to have a leverage), it's often insurmountable. I known relatives in this situation for 20+ years.
• heisenbit 9y ago
  People who recognize they are having a mental health issue and are working on getting better are often not really the problem. We all wish them better. What is a problem are people mental issues creating trouble for others. It can get compounded by bosses looking the other way as results are coming in so there is no problem. Except the costs were externalized to the team around them.
• losteverything 9y ago
  Here is what i learned from my now blue collar career and my old white collar career Take sick days. Plan sick days. My corp job had unlimited sick Time - after 5 days required disability. I felt i had to go every day; no breaks. No way to get a health day. Wanted to be that (very stupid) employee that never took a sick day. Didnt realize it benefited company. I chose my company over my family by not calling out. I wasnt "sick" i thought. My Blue collar jobs i have to show sick dr note, but that is quite legit and easy. No stress. Dont feel well; tired? Back hurts? Spouse ill? I call out. NO GUILT. Avoid the mental health or stress words. Use stomach or lyme or back injury or vision. Looking back all my "i dont call in sick" didnt do me one iota of good Now, i take off if and when i want. How i wish i was blue collar first before white collar
• logicalmind 9y ago
  One of the hardest things to explain to anyone is burnout and the after effects. I've experienced it myself, along with plenty of people around me. But I also know many friends and family members who are committing themselves to their jobs beyond their ability to healthily sustain their lives. This includes working very long hours, essentially never turning work "off". It impacts their health, their relationships and their mental well-being. Trying to warn people who have yet to deal with it seems impossible. I've had sit-down heart-to-heart conversations with people I love about commitment to work, expectation setting, work/life balances, etc. and I've never had a good outcome. I've watched people go through the inevitable physical sickness that never seems to go away, and then have that turn into emotional and mental sickness which also never seems to go away. In the end, I always wish there was something more I could do to help them head this off. But no matter how hard I've tried it still happens.
• lists 9y ago
  Your mind is localized to your brain. Your brain is apart of your body.
• profpandit 9y ago
  Well, mental health has always been and will continue to be an issue that needs to be addressed in the workplace. This is because the workplace now is at least half composed of programming related tasks. Programming is such a mentally tasking task due to the need to get everything just right to get your computer to do what you want with it, that the fallout from it could be compared to a hangover. Your mental faculties do get tired by the process of programming leaving you in the lurch when you step outside that mental zone, and making you susceptible to attacks on issues unrelated to programming, that many managers and other people that don't exercise their mental faculties enough tend to indulge in. As a programmer, it's just as important to learn what to do outside of your programming related tasks, specially ways to relax and rejuvenate your mental faculties. If you don't do this, you'll burn yourself out leaving you susceptible to mental disease.
  • id_rsa 9y ago
    I agree with what you are saying. I am having trouble finding tasks that rejuvenate my mental facilities. What works for you?
    • profpandit 9y ago
      Exercise. Cooking. Sketching. Paying attention to grooming. Practicing ignoring people as much as possbile in public. Reducing the amount of information I process outside of programming. --> Not using a smartphone. Using public transport. Minimizing internet use, no social media. Walking as much as possible to help slow things down. Consciously taking breaks from mental work, instead of just getting absorbed in a programming task. The equivalent of interval training. its possible to strengthen your ability to focus while you program through interval training. Observing nature, such as bird-watching, wind conditions, cloud formations etc.
• Sevii 9y ago
  We have too many people with mental health issues in general. You would think it should be a societal goal.
• Aa0535626251 9y ago
  Hnooch707
• whiddershins 9y ago
  I find it strange any employee would need to be specific about a sick day. In general, we as a culture tend towards confidentiality about medical conditions. I have rarely used sick days when in a salaried position, and take a bit of pride in that. But when I do, I expect to not need to explain myself. And I have no problem on a personal ethics level using a sick day for pretty much anything that feels beyond my control, unavoidable, unexpected, and would prevent me from doing a good job. Maybe that's not the exact letter of what a sick day is for in my employment agreement, but I've never been questioned about a sick day. I am under the impression the stipulations about what a sick day can be used for are protection against abuse by employees who will game the system. Since that's not me, I don't give it much thought.
• pcarolan 9y ago
  My cousin worked at European owned bank that had "mental health days". I liked that term because it sounded more proactive than reactive. They were viewed as a way to take care of your mind and reduce stress. You could use them for baseball games or just relaxing at home.
• danpalmer 9y ago
  While I think most companies need to do better at making this acceptable, and I'm in no way downplaying the importance of treating mental health like any other health issue... One of the things I like about our unlimited/flexible vacation policy is that I don't have to justify time off and can take it at short notice. I think there's quite a spectrum from "vacation for an event", through "vacation to relax" to "time off for burnout" and finally to "sick days for mental health" – I don't think there are clear cut lines between some of these. I tend to take relatively short notice days off to relax and recharge after stressful periods, and while I call it a vacation day, it's probably much closer to this. Unlimited vacation policies get a lot of criticism, but I see this as a big benefit.