I need to go on benefits for a short term period so I can recover and rebuild myself.
It would also give me time to re-evaluate my life and do my therapy without all the stressors at work.
I am thinking about a year.
What do you all think about that as a plan?
It’s not a bad idea. I mean, you’ll have to explain to prospective employers why you didn’t work for a year, but that’s the main downside I see. I wish I could’ve taken more time off after my psychotic breaks; I think I would’ve recovered much more quickly. If taking some time off is an option for you, I would say it’s not a bad option.
Maby speak to your employer and ask if you can take a sabbatical, the company I am at has that option, although a year is a long time. I think the only way to know if your fully recovered is if your able to work, and you might not get a clear picture of your functioning if you quit your job for recovery purposes.
Maby see if you can reduce hours further as an option or work from home. Find out first from employer what they can offer
I kind of did that and it worked out OK. I unloaded trucks for four years from 1993-1997. But near the end I burned out and I called in sick too much and kept asking for fewer hours the last four months. I was highly successful at this job for quite awhile but I finally quit; things changed, new people got hired. Too many changes so I quit and joined a day program.
The program wasn’t terribly strict or hard so I went there 3 or 4 days a week. We had groups and art classes, chores, breaks, watched videos on a VCR, ate lunch. After about 8 or 9 months a counselor came up to me and she had an ad she clipped out of the newspaper that a company was looking for a park ranger, no experience necessary.
I thought no way could I do it but the counselor had faith in me so I applied and became a park ranger, lol! I ended up staying almost two years. Actually the job wasn’t what I pictured it to be. I pictured walking through greenery, seeing lots of animals, friendly park goers asking me questions about trees and deer. The reality was much different. It involved a lot of emptying garbage cans and picking up trash, cleaning restrooms, lots of being bored out of mind just sitting around for hours.
It had it’s good points like I got my own pick-up truck to patrol the parks, I had a cool uniform and I had a lot of responsibility. But occasionally there was a lot of hard work. Anyways, that was my highest status job and I’m glad I did it.
But yeah, taking off 9 months didn’t hurt me at all. I adjusted to working again with no problem. And now 20 years later I’m still working and I plan to ride this job out until they fire me or I drop in my tracks from fatigue which is very likely.
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