When I had the flu a handful of years ago, it knocked me solidly on my ass for an extremely long time. I got over the worst of it in a few days, but I had a cough and brutally sore throat from it that didn't go away for a month. Now I get the flu shot, because eff that if I can avoid it or at least reduce my chances.
That was a super weird flu, too. I remember my skin hurt. The lightest touch, or even the skin shifting with the movement of an arm was painful. It was the weirdest thing, and I wondered if I was unique in it until I mentioned it to a coworker and they were like YES MY SKIN HURT TOO, SO WEIRD
Pain and general malaise are actually not at all unusual for many or most strains of flu. H1N1 in particular was notorious for causing people infected with it to be in constant severe pain.
The reason it seems uncommon is because 60-70% of the time (at a guess from personal experience, not based on epidemiological data or anything), people who think they have the flu actually just have nasty respiratory infections. Influenza completely puts you on your ass, as you describe here.
Yeah, I think that's probably why I had such a laissez-faire attitude towards my risk of flu for so long? It just seemed like a lot of people (especially when I was younger) would talk about "getting the flu" and it would actually just be a standard stomach bug with maybe some congestion.
This past year, reading about how bad the flu season was, and reading about lots of super healthy people (even athletes, in the peak of health) were dying, sometimes suddenly, from the flu...I think I gained a larger understanding about how dangerous it could actually be? Because yeah, I'd always thought it was something less severe (that you only had to worry about if you were in a high-risk/high-danger pool), as a lot of people would describe it that way. It's what finally made me decide to get the flu shot for the first time, which I'll be aiming to take yearly from now on.
I'm being kept on for a couple more weeks to cover the gap between when my contract ends and when the new guy starts, so that's one less thing to worry about. The only surefire bit of sub work I've been able to find is a two hour commute (one way) so that sucks.
Yeah, I couldn’t even stand for two days when I had the flu.
And then there’s all the people who confuse it with gastroenteritis/norovirus, both of which can be nasty for sure, but the only real risk they incur is dehydration. And generally as crappy as they make you feel, you’re not knocked for six in the way you are with the flu.
This is actually making me wonder if I actually had the flu that one time as a teenager, or if I just had a stomach bug. My mother said I had "the flu" and I remember being miserable for a few days, but it was only for a few days. This could've also been one of the reasons I thought flu wasn't a huge deal.
I definitely had the flu in 2012, which was the "skin hurts" kind I mentioned. That was also the kind that the coworker friend gave to me after "jokingly" coughing on me after he had the flu. I don't think he expected me to actually get it...but yeah, it sucked!
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Donovan PuppyfuckerA dagger in the dark isworth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered Userregular
Here full time workers get 4 weeks (as 20 work days) of paid annual leave, and 10 days of sick leave per year. Annual leave rolls over and must be used or paid out by the time you leave the company, sick days do not. So in a typical year I would actually be sick for maybe one or two days, I would take one or two days off sick even though I wasn't because I wanted a long weekend or I had a bunch of shit I needed to get done on a weekday, and I'd take one or two weeks worth of annual leave and get the rest paid out to me.
Now that I work for myself, if I'm sick I just cancel or reschedule my jobs for that day/those days, and if I want time off, I just don't book any jobs in that time to begin with.
West Wing brought up the idea of federally mandated PTO that, like, follows you from job to job, and I always thought that was a supper interesting idea.
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Donovan PuppyfuckerA dagger in the dark isworth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered Userregular
Ehhh, the current system is far from ideal, but that could shift some pretty big burdens onto smaller companies. For instance, say someone gets a government job and over the course of 8 or 9 years they accrue quite a large backlog of PTO, then they decide they want to move to a small town and concentrate on raising a family, so they get a job at a small business there. Does the previous government job pay forward the balance directly to the smaller business, or is the new business stuck owing their brand new employee tens of thousands of dollars worth of paid time off?
Well since I got turned down for support I really did say ㄴㄴㄷㄲㅈ to my boss about it
Seriously I have backed up worked as support 3 times and I get passed over it for the non threatening people?
They get praise for doing less than me? {I am not proud to say I can stock an isle and do the support job that's 3 times more than most people do at the same level}
At my job once you use up all your sick time you get 75% sick days, or moved to Long Term Disability if you are off for a lot of consecutive days (which is also paid at 75%).
there is no limit to how long LTD can last but you do need medical documentation for it.
The flu season being so bad this year has one silver lining here as from now on the quadrivalent flu shot will (most likely) be free instead of only the trivalent one.
I get 29, which is pretty solid US wise, but young kids make it tough here. Daycare cancelled? PTO day. Kid is sick? PTO day. Kid had a fever yesterday? PTO day (our daycare requires 24 hrs fever free). When you have 2, I end up burning 10+ just on that stuff.
If it was a choice of 20 PTO/sick or 10 sick and 10 vacation, I'd take the combined. But places I've been to that have sick leave tend to give you a lot more of it than they do vacation. They also tend to not roll- over like vacation or get paid out when you leave. I think I get paid half of my sick time if I leave my current job and all of my vacation time.
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
When you are sick, it’s not a vacation. You need actual vacation time to take a break and relax. It’s not just “time off” work.
So there seems to be an idea that PTO in all instances is only for "relaxing and vacation time". This is not how companies I have worked with in the past have used/offered PTO. PTO has often been, for me, "paid time off for whatever you want or need". It will cover mental health days, sick days, vacation, errand-running, etc. For this reason, you generally get a single large pool of time to use for "whatever" rather than two pools of time to use for specific things. All I am saying is that I personally prefer the large pool of "whatever" time, because for me it works best. I'm not sure why this is being considered such a contentious and malicious/attacking-others opinion. Christ.
To repeat myself again, I'm not suggesting that sick time is fun. I'm not suggesting that sick time is vacation time.
And now I won't talk about it any more!
I think a lot of it has to do with both the work culture and the family status of the people involved.
If you're catering to a bunch of single people and people without kids (people in the gaming industry in general), they're far more likely to use their PTO days for everything from "eh just don't feel like coming in" to "okay taking a month off to go hiking!"
But if you work with a bunch of 40 something year old nurses who have 3 kids, they hoard their PTO in case their kids get sick. But the real reason is because they want to take another week off for vacation.
So everyone ends up going to work sick and making everyone else sick. The medical field is like the worst for this too, because, they should all know better.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
I also have a joint pool for PTO. it covers everything. It sounds great on paper, and largely has been, but if I take too many "unscheduled" days off they can write me up and fire me. I don't get sick often, but you better believe my toddler does. He just so happened to get sick three fridays in a row last month. That made me look super bad, but thankfully i have a long track record of good time and a good relationship with my boss. But if I didn't, maybe i'd just get fired for using my PTO as I needed it. who knows!
Also, I can technically only use 3 of my sick days for my kids. My manager either doesn't know this, or doesn't care, so I just use whatever whenever. But my husband's work, which has the same policy, definitely keeps track. He also needs to get doctor's notes and such all the time, but I've never been asked for one.
So I stay home with the kids a lot.
If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing
The best system is always "here's your vacation time, you have unlimited sick days please don't come in sick" and then have upper management actually do some work and shit all over middle and lower management when they penalize people for using it.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
DynagripBreak me a million heartsHoustonRegistered User, ClubPAregular
yesterday was kind of a shitty engineering day for me. a design change on a system that I'd spent the past few weeks on is pretty much getting completely scrapped and rolled back to a design I'd considered over a month ago but moved on from. Also, I've designed a floor lock thing from reverse engineering some other ones and we printed out the parts to see if it would work. And it doesn't. And I do not yet know why. I think maybe the fact that it's compliant plastic vs. metal is having an impact but I can't say for certain. Certainly not with enough certainty to just pull the trigger and order $2k worth of parts. Argh.
This is the downside of being paid to figure stuff out.
Having to have a doctor's note for a sick day is the dumbest thing.
I understand why it is the way it is, and I also realize not everyone has the ability to respond this way, but I usually go "I'm an adult I don't need mommy, daddy, or the doctor to tell me it's okay to stay home when I'm sick" when someone asks for one.
The people who are chronic abusers need to be addressed directly, not adjust policy so you can avoid the fucking confrontation of dealing with a person.
That's all sick day policies like that are, is because someone who was uncomfortable being a manager didn't want to tell George he can't keep taking fridays and mondays off every 3 weeks.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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DynagripBreak me a million heartsHoustonRegistered User, ClubPAregular
The idea of pto following you from job to job is a bit out there, but a centrally regulated minimum is a good idea
if you have your eye on the ball you can negotiate it for it with your new employer. Which is what I inadvertently did when I mentioned offhand during the interview that I got 3 weeks vacation.
Having to have a doctor's note for a sick day is the dumbest thing.
I understand why it is the way it is, and I also realize not everyone has the ability to respond this way, but I usually go "I'm an adult I don't need mommy, daddy, or the doctor to tell me it's okay to stay home when I'm sick" when someone asks for one.
The people who are chronic abusers need to be addressed directly, not adjust policy so you can avoid the fucking confrontation of dealing with a person.
That's all sick day policies like that are, is because someone who was uncomfortable being a manager didn't want to tell George he can't keep taking fridays and mondays off every 3 weeks.
Also the office manager tried to give me the third degree because I was able to kinda-sorta work on friday before ducking out early and I was still sick after the weekend was over.
When I called in earlier this week I sounded like a frog had sex with an accordion and she thought I should have been better after the weekend.
Yeah uh, some sicknesses last longer than 2 days buddy. The bad ones last 2+ weeks.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
While the amount of PTO I get sucks, at least my boss is understanding, and considers "Sick of being at work" to be just as valid a reason to take time off.
Before following any advice, opinions, or thoughts I may have expressed in the above post, be warned: I found Keven Costners "Waterworld" to be a very entertaining film.
Ehhh, the current system is far from ideal, but that could shift some pretty big burdens onto smaller companies. For instance, say someone gets a government job and over the course of 8 or 9 years they accrue quite a large backlog of PTO, then they decide they want to move to a small town and concentrate on raising a family, so they get a job at a small business there. Does the previous government job pay forward the balance directly to the smaller business, or is the new business stuck owing their brand new employee tens of thousands of dollars worth of paid time off?
The latter. The idea is to treat it more like a 401k or Roth IRA than a pension. Most people are going to have a fairly large number of jobs throughout their lives, and the idea of working in one place for 45 years, then retiring, is pretty outdated. Getting a new job sucks, and the idea of losing benefits like PTO or a pension can cause people to stay in a job they hate, or prevent them from trying new things, and makes being laid off all the worse.
If the idea that automation and globalization is flat out going to destroy some industries, in favor of creating some new ones, that means the number of forced career changes is going to number in the millions. No longer tying PTO accrual to your job would go a long way to alleviating that.
Speaking of sick days, my throat has clogged up for some reason but given that the flu isn't a reason to call in sick to work as a cashier at a grocery store I assume this isn't either
Luckily I have today off and hopefully it clears up otherwise tomorrow will be fuuuuuun
While I lived in Germany, the company required you to get a doctors note after 3 days because they could then claim my days pay from insurance.
Weird system but it definitely felt like they didnt trust me to know when I was sick. It was annoying to because finding a good english speaking doctor was oddly hard. Plenty of people spoke English.... but then doctors in particular didn't?
Ehhh, the current system is far from ideal, but that could shift some pretty big burdens onto smaller companies. For instance, say someone gets a government job and over the course of 8 or 9 years they accrue quite a large backlog of PTO, then they decide they want to move to a small town and concentrate on raising a family, so they get a job at a small business there. Does the previous government job pay forward the balance directly to the smaller business, or is the new business stuck owing their brand new employee tens of thousands of dollars worth of paid time off?
The latter. The idea is to treat it more like a 401k or Roth IRA than a pension. Most people are going to have a fairly large number of jobs throughout their lives, and the idea of working in one place for 45 years, then retiring, is pretty outdated. Getting a new job sucks, and the idea of losing benefits like PTO or a pension can cause people to stay in a job they hate, or prevent them from trying new things, and makes being laid off all the worse.
If the idea that automation and globalization is flat out going to destroy some industries, in favor of creating some new ones, that means the number of forced career changes is going to number in the millions. No longer tying PTO accrual to your job would go a long way to alleviating that.
The only issue with that is that one benefit with PTO is that, with pay rises over time it increases in value.
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FMLA just means they can’t fire you. You would t get paid for the missed time beyond what your PTO would cover
Yeah, I think that's probably why I had such a laissez-faire attitude towards my risk of flu for so long? It just seemed like a lot of people (especially when I was younger) would talk about "getting the flu" and it would actually just be a standard stomach bug with maybe some congestion.
This past year, reading about how bad the flu season was, and reading about lots of super healthy people (even athletes, in the peak of health) were dying, sometimes suddenly, from the flu...I think I gained a larger understanding about how dangerous it could actually be? Because yeah, I'd always thought it was something less severe (that you only had to worry about if you were in a high-risk/high-danger pool), as a lot of people would describe it that way. It's what finally made me decide to get the flu shot for the first time, which I'll be aiming to take yearly from now on.
And then there’s all the people who confuse it with gastroenteritis/norovirus, both of which can be nasty for sure, but the only real risk they incur is dehydration. And generally as crappy as they make you feel, you’re not knocked for six in the way you are with the flu.
I definitely had the flu in 2012, which was the "skin hurts" kind I mentioned. That was also the kind that the coworker friend gave to me after "jokingly" coughing on me after he had the flu. I don't think he expected me to actually get it...but yeah, it sucked!
Now that I work for myself, if I'm sick I just cancel or reschedule my jobs for that day/those days, and if I want time off, I just don't book any jobs in that time to begin with.
Seriously I have backed up worked as support 3 times and I get passed over it for the non threatening people?
They get praise for doing less than me? {I am not proud to say I can stock an isle and do the support job that's 3 times more than most people do at the same level}
there is no limit to how long LTD can last but you do need medical documentation for it.
They intentionally built in the south since it is staunchly anti union, but we will hopefully unionize the next time they put it to a vote.
PSN:Furlion
Like if you say you have a cold, people assume you have just the sniffles.
If you say the flu, you have to be pretty damn sick
But theres many states in between that one is not good enough to be at work but arn't easily said without either overblowing or underreporting it.
I think a lot of it has to do with both the work culture and the family status of the people involved.
If you're catering to a bunch of single people and people without kids (people in the gaming industry in general), they're far more likely to use their PTO days for everything from "eh just don't feel like coming in" to "okay taking a month off to go hiking!"
But if you work with a bunch of 40 something year old nurses who have 3 kids, they hoard their PTO in case their kids get sick. But the real reason is because they want to take another week off for vacation.
So everyone ends up going to work sick and making everyone else sick. The medical field is like the worst for this too, because, they should all know better.
Steam ID: Obos Vent: Obos
So I stay home with the kids a lot.
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This is the downside of being paid to figure stuff out.
I understand why it is the way it is, and I also realize not everyone has the ability to respond this way, but I usually go "I'm an adult I don't need mommy, daddy, or the doctor to tell me it's okay to stay home when I'm sick" when someone asks for one.
The people who are chronic abusers need to be addressed directly, not adjust policy so you can avoid the fucking confrontation of dealing with a person.
That's all sick day policies like that are, is because someone who was uncomfortable being a manager didn't want to tell George he can't keep taking fridays and mondays off every 3 weeks.
if you have your eye on the ball you can negotiate it for it with your new employer. Which is what I inadvertently did when I mentioned offhand during the interview that I got 3 weeks vacation.
Oh without a doubt.
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I feel a doctors note should be required after say...a week?
But a doctors note for 1 or 2 days off is unnecessary
When I called in earlier this week I sounded like a frog had sex with an accordion and she thought I should have been better after the weekend.
Yeah uh, some sicknesses last longer than 2 days buddy. The bad ones last 2+ weeks.
It's unnecessary for a week too. We're all adults here, we can tell if the flu, mono, or pneumonia requires us to stay home (yes please stay home).
Do you know what questions a doctor is gonna ask before they write you a note?
"They paid their copay, right?"
A doctors note usually just says "I saw whats-his-name today" and no more. It is not proof of anything except that you paid some money to a doctor.
My doctor used to ask me, "So what do you want it to say?"
The latter. The idea is to treat it more like a 401k or Roth IRA than a pension. Most people are going to have a fairly large number of jobs throughout their lives, and the idea of working in one place for 45 years, then retiring, is pretty outdated. Getting a new job sucks, and the idea of losing benefits like PTO or a pension can cause people to stay in a job they hate, or prevent them from trying new things, and makes being laid off all the worse.
If the idea that automation and globalization is flat out going to destroy some industries, in favor of creating some new ones, that means the number of forced career changes is going to number in the millions. No longer tying PTO accrual to your job would go a long way to alleviating that.
Luckily I have today off and hopefully it clears up otherwise tomorrow will be fuuuuuun
Weird system but it definitely felt like they didnt trust me to know when I was sick. It was annoying to because finding a good english speaking doctor was oddly hard. Plenty of people spoke English.... but then doctors in particular didn't?
The only issue with that is that one benefit with PTO is that, with pay rises over time it increases in value.
Which is then why companies force you to take it.
(it would be nice though)
Satans..... hints.....
“Drez must have a mini-fridge added to his cubicle, stocked daily with artisan beers, for his condition to improve.”
In the ER we hand out notes for 2 days. Don't care why you were there or what we found. If you want one, you get one.