Work vs Health
I mentioned in the past that I Don’t Like Working. I would dare say that most people don’t, but the culture of ABH- Always Be Hustling is a difficult one to break out of. And this is even if you get sick. There was a tweet that went viral a year ago:
This is one of those “it’s funny cause it’s true” moments. My boss was in the ER texting & emailing us updates and going over the sales goals we had for the month. From a hospital bed. Thankfully the culture at my job supports the fact that we all told her to get the fuck off her work emails and to focus on herself. But, that is still the mindset here. You are in the damn hospital or need to get surgery and the first thought isn’t “I need to focus on myself and feel better”. Instead it’s “I can’t be out of work…this is a huge inconvenience to my company/coworkers/team…I cannot miss this meeting on Wednesday because it’s too important for this project.” One of my coworkers announced the sale of a home while she was in labor for crying out loud. It is complete bullshit.
So, why am I bringing this up? Well, last week I had my yearly checkup and the doctor noticed something. Didn’t seem to be an issue so we all moved on. A few days later, said no issue had grown (literally) and the working theory is that I have a cyst, but we don’t know for sure. A cyst is my best-case scenario. Was told to see a gynecologist ASAP. Not something anyone wants to hear. Try to make an appointment and I am told that I need to wait until May. Freaking May. That is how quickly they can urgently see me. Then an appointment fell through while I was on the phone. They could see me this week. Awesome. It’s on the same day as a huge meeting at work. My immediate reaction was, “No. I cannot miss that meeting.” I scheduled it for May and hung up.
Thankfully, my spouse (who has gone to work when he should have gone to the doctor plenty of times) immediately pointed out the absolute absurdity of what the hell I just did. Still took a shower before it sunk in that I just put my health at risk for a meeting that could be a goddamn email. I called back and they thankfully still had the appointment available. So, I go in this week vs May. Is my job cool with it? Frankly, I don’t give a fuck. It’s utterly terrifying to me how much we put at risk for a job that would replace us in a week if we died. Where you are made to feel guilty when you are ill or choose to take time off. What a toxic culture we have created.
Have you ever had a similar situation? What did you choose?
Feature Photo by Colter Olmstead on Unsplash
Oh I’m REALLY glad that you took the appointment this week. I hope it goes ok.
As for me, too too many times to count. I about killed myself and definitely destroyed my health by putting work first and even though I started breaking the habits of a workaholic when JB was born, I still had a long way to go to break the mindset of one. I think I finally started really absorbing that lesson with the pandemic with having to balance needing an income and needing to prioritize our lives. It’s so ingrained that work has to come first for fear of losing a livelihood (in my case more out of a survival thing than a social thing but still equally unhealthy) that undoing that thinking at the deepest levels is a long process. I still catch those moments when I’m automatically putting work first and making myself reconsider that reflex.
Thanks! It went okay. 👍🏿
I get it. Being the sole breadwinner now has skewed things a bit for my mindset for sure, but thankfully I snapped the hell outta that.
Hi friend!!! So glad you made the decision to go with the appointment over the work meeting. Stupid grind culture makes it difficult to make those choices sometimes. I hope you get answers that will give you peace of mind.
My coworkers work when they’re sick and they work over the weekend. Drives me bananas. On one hand, fine, do what you want to do; on the other, you’re lending to unreasonable expectations at work. I am not going to work outside of my work hours and I’m sure as hell not putting my job over my health. The other day someone sent me a meeting invite for a weekly 7 AM meeting (I don’t start until 8 and even then I’m a sleepy disaster) and after thinking about it for a few minutes, I declined. Just not workable for me and that is okay! I suspect the meeting will be a time waster anyway, but if there is something important to be shared, there’s always email or Teams.
Anyway, wishing you the best. Again, I hope you get clear answers and reassurance soon.
Thanks! The appointment went well. The best-case scenario of a cyst was confirmed.
Yeah, I hate it when my coworkers do it as well. Spreading around their germs while doing subpar work because they are sick. Just go home and recover to 100% and then come back. The job will get done either way.
I do it all the time, with small choices like working through lunch and skipping the gym to work late. I try to remember that no-one else actually notices those small sacrifices, no-one is patting you on the back for it and no-one would care if you chose yourself over work 99% of the time. Learn to identify that 1% where you really do need to lean into your work, and you’ll be able to do it if you haven’t been wasting your effort all those other times.
I am going to repeat what everyone else has said and am thanking God you went ahead and scheduled the appointment. It is so hard to break that cycle, and I totally get why you were like, no big deal, I can wait, because I probably would have done the same thing initially. We are so focused on our careers and the pressure we literally struggle to decide what needs to come first, when the obvious answer is that WE need to come first.
Anyways, I am glad you are getting in to be seen and I hope it is best-case scenario. Fingers crossed and sending up a prayer!
Thanks! It went well and the surgery is done now. Post Opt tomorrow. 🙂