Welcome back thewinchester - wasnt aware you'd been ill so hopefully that's (getting?) sorted.
Thanks.
My issue has been a long standing mental health battle - specifically clinical depression. I've been dealing with the 'black dog' since diagnosis seven years ago, and a combination of workplace and personal factors haven't helped to facilitate as fast a recovery and quality of professional support as one might have liked.
I actually don't mind disclosing it or talking about it in public, because I've found there needs to be better recognition and understanding of mental health within the workplace. It has improved somewhat in the preceeding five years, but there are still too many workplaces who don't understand how what they do impacts differently on those with mental health conditions.
The next paragraph or three are a little carthatic for me, so you can just read the next one alone if you want the
tl;dr version.
While not going into too much details; my previous boss when working in the public service was, for want of a better expression, a complete and utter sod. Though the law says that you can't discriminate or target someone on the basis of a diagnosed and disclosed medical issue, he made dammed sure to do everything up to the point where he did that - just not a clear enough textbook breach that would see him hung, drawn and quartered on the spot.
The amount of BS I had to tolerate from this manager, and the lengths I had to go to so that I could put a stop to it have made 20yr veteran mental health professionals recoil in complete horror and disbelief. As one step of bringing my supposed performance and behaivoural issues to a head, our HR department referred me to a 3rd party workplace Psychataric specialist for assessment.
To put it mildly, HR were pretty horrified by the answers to their questions that came back, because they knew full well that they had to either reign in my boss or they had a lawsuit on their hands. They even refused initally to hand over said professionals' report, but relented only after I warned them I would be going down the FOI and Employee File Access path to get my hands on it, and they received legal advice it would be unwise to withhold.
The only reasons I persisted is because I knew that despite all the BS, my role in the organisation was of primary importance. It had taken them 3 1/2yrs to fill my role before I started. While walking away may have been expedient and likely caused me a whole lot less stress and fustration - I prefer the challenge, and would rather complete the task or mission I set out to do; rather than walk away and leave things in a half-done state because of some two-bit manager who was on a mission to make my life hell.
Dealing with mental health issues is none too dissimilar to the African proverb that you eat an elephant one bite at a time. Based on where I am now, it could be at least another 5-7 years before I can fully put it behind me; due mostly to how far back and the severity of the root causes behind my depression and not maintaining consistent treatment.
I for one don't envy anyone dealing with any long-term illness. Unlike cancers, degenerative conditions and the like - depression isn't something that you can point at on an x-ray or chart and conclusivly pinpoint or isolate. Neither is there a magic pill or guaranteed treatment to send it on its way.
I wish I was kidding when I suggest that i've looked at some of the more extreme treatment options to put it behind me (these include Electroconvulsive therapy, or much milder treatments under development and testing such as Direct current stimulation and mild brain stimulation), but these are moreso because I'm a process orientated and outcomes based person and on my really down days I just wish this is something I could put an end to quickly, rather than months and years of medication combined with therapy sessions.
Anyway, that's just me getting something off my mind. Don't read anything into it, just an insight into the workings of a high functioning person battling a ****ty neurological condition.
