I have seen the beginnings of this in the form of people referring to taking a "mental health day". I have yet to hear of any employer codifying it as part of a PTO policy (people just use their...
So rather than the nervous breakdown writ large, we could introduce a more modestly scaled version of it
...
Achieving widespread cultural acceptance of the practice may take less time than you’d expect
I have seen the beginnings of this in the form of people referring to taking a "mental health day". I have yet to hear of any employer codifying it as part of a PTO policy (people just use their sick days). It's also a fairly privileged thing to be able to do at all, to have either the financial security or time if benefits to just say "I'm going to take a day to just take care of me, even though there's nothing physically wrong with me".
I can understand why people feel differently, but I agree and think it’s kind of important that they are considered sick days. Sick days are for your health. IMO. that covers physical, mental, and...
I can understand why people feel differently, but I agree and think it’s kind of important that they are considered sick days. Sick days are for your health. IMO. that covers physical, mental, and emotional health. I don’t want separate days for mental vs physical health, I want it to be normal for all three of those aspects of health to be weighed equally for once. I don’t want to be juggling how many mental health vs physical health days are offered across job interviews and try to guess how bad my mental illness is going to be across the year. But then again, I think companies should have unlimited vacation time with a rule that forces employees to take at least 5 days off every 6 months so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Very much agree. I didn't mean to imply that there should be a distinction between mental and physical health days off. My thoughts are mainly centered around the stigma in many workplaces around...
I don’t want separate days for mental vs physical health, I want it to be normal for all three of those aspects of health to be weighed equally for once. I don’t want to be juggling how many mental health vs physical health days are offere
Very much agree. I didn't mean to imply that there should be a distinction between mental and physical health days off. My thoughts are mainly centered around the stigma in many workplaces around taking days off, unless you are seriously ill. Physical illness or injury makes it a lot easier to "demonstrate" that you're taking a day off for "legitimate" reasons.
It's going to be a long hard journey to try and reshape the American work ethic to the point where someone saying "I need tomorrow off, I'm not in a good mental space" is considered normal and healthy and not a "slacker" who should be fired and replaced at the first opportunity.
I completely agree! Sorry if I came off as not. I don't expect it to be simple. It's definitely a pie-in-the-sky thing that won't come into reality for probably a decade or more if ever. Like you...
I completely agree! Sorry if I came off as not. I don't expect it to be simple. It's definitely a pie-in-the-sky thing that won't come into reality for probably a decade or more if ever. Like you said, before we can tackle this, we'll have to tackle mindsets of people like my parents who have over 300 sick days because they never use them and they roll over. We regularly get into arguments about "work-ethic" and how they "just view work differently than I do". Which is to say they don't understand why I put my foot down and stand up for my heath and don't let my employer grind me in to a poor, overworked, miserable dust like they have.
Yeah I can do this, thanks to a union. I have 5 weeks of PTO a year, and I can use them however the fuck I please as long as I give proper notice and it doesn’t fall under the 2 months of peak...
Yeah I can do this, thanks to a union.
I have 5 weeks of PTO a year, and I can use them however the fuck I please as long as I give proper notice and it doesn’t fall under the 2 months of peak season (the holidays).
Title should just be “Bring back unions and the labor movement”.
Yea, I grew up in a deeply red state on the west coast where unions are only mentioned after talking about how useless they are and how much they prevent things from getting done. It was years...
Yea, I grew up in a deeply red state on the west coast where unions are only mentioned after talking about how useless they are and how much they prevent things from getting done.
It was years after I moved away from home before I learned what the purpose of a union actually was, how they function, how they originated, and what they've done to improve worker conditions even for those not in a union.
Your PTO days are PTO days. It’s not any more privileged to take a day off whenever you feel like it for whatever reason than taking a day off for anything else. Unless we’re going talk about the...
Your PTO days are PTO days. It’s not any more privileged to take a day off whenever you feel like it for whatever reason than taking a day off for anything else. Unless we’re going talk about the concept or PTO as a privilege in general I don’t see what the problem is. And I don’t really see the usefulness in that characterization.
Now there are places with finite vacation leave but unlimited sick leave with the understanding that you don’t abuse the sick leave policy. That’s the only place where this gets dicey, but that’s also a pretty rare occurrence.
I believe that (some) German companies have a policy known as "null bock Tag", something like a joker card you can play when you just don't feel like working today, no question asked. In France,...
I believe that (some) German companies have a policy known as "null bock Tag", something like a joker card you can play when you just don't feel like working today, no question asked.
In France, if a worker is tired and overwhelmed, the doctor won't flinch in prescribing a few days of resting, the first three unpaid and the rest compensated at half the salary by the nation-wide mandatory health insurance. (adequate follow-up guaranted if needed).
Health start with little things, including mental health.
In the last two decades, digital electronics, along with many benefits, have wrought upon societies a flood of mental pollutions, and our mental hygiene routines, the common-sense etiquette, have somewhat failed to catch up. That's what requires our attention, a deliberate effort, and some decisions, delicate indeed, to be taken at all levels of society.
Now, I am certainly glad that psychiatry and pharmacy have progressed so much since the 19^th century and that we now know better than this vague diagnostic of "nervous breakdown" that catche everything from a bout of bad temper to a life-threatening depression.
I am not worried for the super-rich, though : they can still take a six-months vacation on the French riviera if they so desire.
Bottom line : the author of this article should really have taken some rest.
I have seen the beginnings of this in the form of people referring to taking a "mental health day". I have yet to hear of any employer codifying it as part of a PTO policy (people just use their sick days). It's also a fairly privileged thing to be able to do at all, to have either the financial security or time if benefits to just say "I'm going to take a day to just take care of me, even though there's nothing physically wrong with me".
Well it is a sick day in a sense, it's just that the person isn't physically sick, but mentally sick.
I can understand why people feel differently, but I agree and think it’s kind of important that they are considered sick days. Sick days are for your health. IMO. that covers physical, mental, and emotional health. I don’t want separate days for mental vs physical health, I want it to be normal for all three of those aspects of health to be weighed equally for once. I don’t want to be juggling how many mental health vs physical health days are offered across job interviews and try to guess how bad my mental illness is going to be across the year. But then again, I think companies should have unlimited vacation time with a rule that forces employees to take at least 5 days off every 6 months so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Very much agree. I didn't mean to imply that there should be a distinction between mental and physical health days off. My thoughts are mainly centered around the stigma in many workplaces around taking days off, unless you are seriously ill. Physical illness or injury makes it a lot easier to "demonstrate" that you're taking a day off for "legitimate" reasons.
It's going to be a long hard journey to try and reshape the American work ethic to the point where someone saying "I need tomorrow off, I'm not in a good mental space" is considered normal and healthy and not a "slacker" who should be fired and replaced at the first opportunity.
I completely agree! Sorry if I came off as not. I don't expect it to be simple. It's definitely a pie-in-the-sky thing that won't come into reality for probably a decade or more if ever. Like you said, before we can tackle this, we'll have to tackle mindsets of people like my parents who have over 300 sick days because they never use them and they roll over. We regularly get into arguments about "work-ethic" and how they "just view work differently than I do". Which is to say they don't understand why I put my foot down and stand up for my heath and don't let my employer grind me in to a poor, overworked, miserable dust like they have.
Yeah I can do this, thanks to a union.
I have 5 weeks of PTO a year, and I can use them however the fuck I please as long as I give proper notice and it doesn’t fall under the 2 months of peak season (the holidays).
Title should just be “Bring back unions and the labor movement”.
Yea, I grew up in a deeply red state on the west coast where unions are only mentioned after talking about how useless they are and how much they prevent things from getting done.
It was years after I moved away from home before I learned what the purpose of a union actually was, how they function, how they originated, and what they've done to improve worker conditions even for those not in a union.
Your PTO days are PTO days. It’s not any more privileged to take a day off whenever you feel like it for whatever reason than taking a day off for anything else. Unless we’re going talk about the concept or PTO as a privilege in general I don’t see what the problem is. And I don’t really see the usefulness in that characterization.
Now there are places with finite vacation leave but unlimited sick leave with the understanding that you don’t abuse the sick leave policy. That’s the only place where this gets dicey, but that’s also a pretty rare occurrence.
I believe that (some) German companies have a policy known as "null bock Tag", something like a joker card you can play when you just don't feel like working today, no question asked.
In France, if a worker is tired and overwhelmed, the doctor won't flinch in prescribing a few days of resting, the first three unpaid and the rest compensated at half the salary by the nation-wide mandatory health insurance. (adequate follow-up guaranted if needed).
Health start with little things, including mental health.
In the last two decades, digital electronics, along with many benefits, have wrought upon societies a flood of mental pollutions, and our mental hygiene routines, the common-sense etiquette, have somewhat failed to catch up. That's what requires our attention, a deliberate effort, and some decisions, delicate indeed, to be taken at all levels of society.
Now, I am certainly glad that psychiatry and pharmacy have progressed so much since the 19^th century and that we now know better than this vague diagnostic of "nervous breakdown" that catche everything from a bout of bad temper to a life-threatening depression.
I am not worried for the super-rich, though : they can still take a six-months vacation on the French riviera if they so desire.
Bottom line : the author of this article should really have taken some rest.