I suppose I shouldn’t complain because my workplace does give us the benefit of being able to request sick leave from a sick leave bank — that is, other people have donated unused sick leave and when I’ve used up all of my sick leave and vacation leave, I can request to use that leave from the sick leave donations.
There’s a catch, though. I can’t use any of that leave while I’m actively working which I still am. I typically work three days/week and don’t work the days that I have chemo (every Tuesday) or the days that chemo wipes me out (every Thursday). I’ve had other days when I’ve felt too sick to go into work also. So, I’m not able to take advantage of the sick leave donations while I’m still actively working. As the policy stands, I have to be off of work for two weeks, unpaid, before I’m able to take advantage of the sick leave donation program.
We really can’t afford to give up two weeks of pay from my job. On the other hand, we don’t have any other choice once I run out of vacation time (I’ve already run out of sick leave time) and use up some of my future vacation time (which I’ll probably be allowed to do).
The lady who works with this policy at The Big University where I work (I work at a regional campus) is trying to get the policy amended so that people like me (and there are more, she told me) can take advantage of the sick leave donation program while we’re working part-time. I’ll keep working and using up my vacation time and see if she can get things worked out.
Frank and I are trying to figure out how we’ll make it without 1/2 month’s pay — and we will, somehow — but it all seems incredibly unfair to me. Like I said, maybe I shouldn’t complain because we do have this program in the first place. Maybe I should just be grateful that I can use other peoples’ sick leave and get paid the rest of the time that I’ll be off of work. It just seems unfortunate to me that people who are willing to work won’t be able to because of how the program has been set up. Also, these same people will be forced to stay at home for two weeks without pay before they can take advantage of the sick leave donation program, something that I imagine will be a financial hardship for many people.
It’s just that it’s hard enough to have cancer, go through everything that I have to go through, only to be hit with this. It would be nice for a workplace to be a bit more compassionate when someone is forced to deal with an unexpected health crisis, but I guess, as always, the dollar is the bottom line.
To me, though, we all lose out. I stop working before I need to so my department loses any work that I could do for them. My family and I lose out because we’re forced to find other ways to fund our living expenses for 2 weeks. The university loses in worker morale.
They sure don’t make any of this easy.
Rock - Me - Hard Place
