Prolonged Sick Leave and Handing in Notice of Reesignation

LegacyUser

I have been on sick leave for over a month from my job. Its a good job, I am permanent and have only been in the department for about 8 months. I started taking sick leave over a month ago as the symptoms were interfering with my work, I was spending a lot of my working day-WFH since Covid-trying to juggle my symptoms and actually doing work, and I ended up working most days well into the early hours of the morning, only to start working again maybe 3 or 4 hours later at 7.30 in the morning, most nights I wouldn't make it to my bedroom and would fall asleep in the kitchen cause thats where I do most of my work.

Work didnt know about this at the time, thing came to a head when a colleague was putting a lot of heat on me; and accusing me of not carrying out certain tasks, even when I had to the best of my ability-one particular incident I had carried the task out incorrectly but had misunderstood the meaning, the colleague accused me of lying saying the instructions couldn't have been clearer but I just misunderstood the email, there was no accompanying instructions either-I am saying this honestly I have no reason to lie to strangers on the internet-and having noticed I was doing my work at odd hours, he was under the impression I was up to something dubious and launched an investigation into my team that went all the way up to our manager's manager's manager. Yes 3 managers high.

I was really struggling, especially when this colleague started grilling me accusing me of ignoring tasks, I was trying to defend myself in a webex argument whilst literally puking into a bucket beside me-one of my symptoms-so I handed in a sick leave note and been consistently handing them in ever since. I have taken waaaaaaaay longer sick leave than what the company normally would like, especially I guess since I didnt give them any warning, I am just handing them in week after week, its mostly because my diagnosis is taking forever, I was kind of hoping I would have a diagnosis by now, and with a diagnosis I could get treatment/some sort of cure but everything is very delayed...results that were meant to take a week still havent come to my GP 3 weeks later, certain tests I am supposed to undergo still have not reopened in the hospital, etc. I have received 2 calls from my company's occupational health specialist, normally people never get a call, they I can only assume are getting irritated by the situation, which is fair enough. However, I plan on leaving my job/company to return to college and must give a months notice. I am unsure how to address this situation. Its an awkward position and looks rather.....lazy and suspicious, for lack of a better phrase. I know college will require less contact hours than work and I can make my own schedule for study so I can work around my symptoms if they are still persisting by then. I will be handing in a letter of resignation despite not having worked for a month, and probably will remain on sick leave throughout the duration of this notice.....it looks bad, I know it looks bad. Has anyone any advice?

Xterminator

hi OP

there is a lesson here. if you are ill, then call in sick. if you are unsure about a task, seek clarification.

If it was me i would call me manager and discuss in person, or at lest voice to voice. and put your side across.

Own to your mistakes, and apologise. then hand in your notice. Try to minimise the impact on your employer if you can, by being as flexible as possible and offering to document any tasks and performing a handover when you are up to it.

BattleCorp

Firstly, if you are sick, you are sick. Ignore what your work colleague/anybody else thinks and look after yoursef.

Your health should be your number one priority. Forget about work while you are sick and address looking after yourself.

Personally I see no harm in engaging with your Company's occupational health specialist. They may have advice that can help with your symptoms. You seem stressed so this is possibly an additional factor that may not help your illness and again, maybe you can bring this up with the occupational health specialist. If you are planning on leaving anyway, what harm can it do? It might actually help.

Are you guaranteed a place in college or is it still in the planning? If it is still in the planning stage and you don't have your place yet, don't hand in your notice until you are 100% sure of your place.

If you have your college place guaranteed, and that's what you want to do, just hand in your notice one month before college starts while you are on sick leave and move on with the rest of your life.