I Hate This Advice

[Mrs. Burschman]

My poor husband. He was only parroting what they always say whenever there's some sort of flu outbreak:

"If you feel sick, don't go to work."

Does this annoy anyone else? If I didn't go to work every day I feel sick, I WOULDN'T EVER GO TO WORK.

I guess it should be, "If you feel worse than your normal." Of course, not everyone has chronic illnesses.

Off my soapbox now.

[carinara]

I totally agree. Thats what people tell me as well whenever its obvious to them that i feel sick. Most of the time nobody knows though how i feel. I feel sick on a daily bases at work. I use all my planning skills to get through my working day and every step at work is calculated by me. This sentence doesnt work for me either. Like you said, the only time i cant go to work is when i feel much worse then usual and cant stand up at all.

carinara

[runningshoe]

I hear you on that one! BTW thanks for the pm - doing okay. More later.

[ajw4790]

Hiya,

Nice to see ya again! How are you doing? I did see your one post when you came back a while ago, but was just checking in real quick and didn't respond to any posts. So, saw ya today and thought I would say hi!

I know on the news they are just talking in general terms, so it doesn't bother me. But, if someone was using it to poke fun at me or something then I would take offense to it. It wouldn't be funny if someone in the same room as me heard that and turned around and said something like "Well I guess you shouldn't be here. Lucky you, a day off and you don't even have the flu!" Not only is it rude, but it is also trying to make me feel bad for having a chronic illness. But, overall the general comments on tv about staying home when sick with flu do not bother me. Actually I prefer it, because I don't want to get sick when I am able to go out because people are sharing their germs. I don't get out a lot, so I don't want to get even sicker when I do.

[Tammy]

Okay, here's what I've done to deal with how frustrated I would get by that type of comment. First of all, our illness is not contagious like people who are told to not go into work because they are sick. Therefore, it is more of a comment that is selfish in nature, as no one else wants to get sick and also prevent those like us who have a hard time with virus' ontop of our illness from catching one. Now for how I cope with a comment as such. In my mind, I clarify that me being sick is different than being 'viral'. I will literally state that I feel "viral' if I'm catching something, or that "I feel sick" if my symptoms are really bad. When I was able to work at the beginning of my POTS diagnosis, my co-workers understood how I referred to this and it seemed to be a respectful way for them to understand and helpful for me to not feel like it was a chip on my shoulders. Hope this helps others to see these types of comments in a positive light.

[Janey]

I am completely with you on this one. 1. Because whenever I felt awful in the morning and was agonizing over whether I should get on the train to work, that's the reasoning my partner always used: If you feel sick, don't go to work. BUT IT'S So MUCH MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT!! It's not like it was just a one off, it was an ongoing thing with different degrees of "awful" each day.. so I would think I might as well go in to work today because I could feel worse tomorrow and would rather take that day off than this one.

2. When I DID take days of from work (there were quite a few) all my colleagues used to say "Are you better? Are you better?" when I got back and they didn't have the patience to listen and understand that it wad an ONGOING thing where I'll have some days good, some days bad. So after two sets of days off they'd say "Oh, you get sick a lot don't you, better take some more vitamin C" and it made me want to strangle them!! And just shout "LISTEN TO ME, PEOPLE!!" Arghhh, it is making me mad just discussing it, even though I've now stopped working!!!

Janey

[potsgirl]

Although I had to quit work about 2 years ago, I know just what you mean by the 'I should do it today because I never know if I'll feel even worse tomorrow and not make it at all'. I do this with everything in my life, including exercise, grocery shopping, perhaps a lunch with friends. That to me is the biggest frustration...Never knowing how I'm going to feel the next day!

Jana