Sunday poll

Scribbled by Steve on September 9, 2007 - Comments

It’s been a surprisingly busy weekend with my parents visiting and my wife feeling sick (right after Little Buddy was sick). It’s strange to see tough cold viruses appear in 90 degree weather, but I guess it still happens. I’m OK so far, which is another great mystery of illnesses – out of the three of us, one of us will usually be OK while the other two are sick. I suspect I was a carrier but either didn’t notice or didn’t have any symptoms this time. Illness is a particular worry in a family where one parent works at a contract (i.e. hourly paid) job, the other is a stay-at-home parent and the child is too young for school/daycare (although I plan on putting Little Buddy in the workforce at the age of 4 – that’ll be enough loafing around for him).

So a simple poll question today: if you get sick, do you take off time from work at the first mild sniffle, or are you one of those people who drag themselves in despite being ill, or somewhere in between?

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  • I went to work when I was sick last spring. It was during the busy season and I caught a cold over the weekend. I lost my voice, came down with a nagging cough and looked horrible. Yet I still dragged myself in because I knew we were short handed and I was afraid of holding up the deadline!

    I came home feeling worse because I worked major overtime that day. I think twice now before going into work sick.
  • Thanks for all the responses - I'm envious of those of you who can work from home!
  • I used to always tough it out and drag myself to work. But then I realized that if the illness is something contagious I am really hurting the company more by showing up. It also takes longer to recover if I'm at work, so I'm not productive while working, and I'm sick longer. On the other hand I always feel guilty not going to work if I 'feel fine.'

    In the end I'll stay home if I think it's contagious, but I often end up working from home anyway.
  • It depends on what I have to do at work...if I have a day that I can miss (which is 75% of the time), then I stay home at the first sniffle (riding my bike to work is not fun when I'm sick). However, if it is one of the days I can't miss, I will drag myself to work....it would be too much of a hassle to stay home!
  • That depends on what kind of "sick", right? If I have a flu or a fever and if I could still get to work, I would. And I'd go home if I find myself sleeping in the office. But if I've got a headache, no way, I'd call in sick and stay in bed until I'm well.

    I hate headaches!
  • As a stay at home mom, I work no matter how awful I feel. :)
  • What I normally do is work from home for the day if I feel like I'm getting sick. I don't go into the office, but I don't take time off unless I feel I can't be productive working from home. Luckily, my team is pretty good about doing that as well, and we have the flexibility to work from home, so we can do our part not to spread disease!
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