Sick Days When You Work from Home

Well, it seems we may have brought "con crud" home with us from the Fall Show.  My husband woke up with a slightly sore throat yesterday, which progressed into some congestion throughout the day.  He took medicine before bed, and today I can hear him coughing and fighting congestion while he works.

As for me, I was hoping I would avoid it, but I woke up with the faintest of sore throats this morning.  Any other time I would have assumed it was allergies, but with Zac sick I am playing it safe.  I skipped my ride with my leaser today as I didn't want to expose her to it, and I'm contemplating skipping my dad's appointment tomorrow at the cancer center.  If I am potentially carrying something, the last thing I want to do is to take it to a bunch of chemo patients.

Listening to my husband hack and cough while he works made me think of how sick days have changed.  It used to be that people were expected to largely work through being sick, so hacking and coughing at one's desk wasn't really that surprising a thing.  Then covid put the fear of illness into everyone, and people were expected to stay at home.  But at the same time, the world was shifting to a more virtual workplace in response to covid concerns, so it became a matter of "Don't be selfish and expose other people, but also make sure you do this work as we still need it done."

In a lot of ways, I think this has eroded people's sick days.  While now it's more expected to stay home if you're ill, it's like the corporate world thinks you can still rest while working from home.  So even though your body needs real rest to get better, you're expected to spend your rest time working from home.

Of course, my husband is in a similar boat as I am.  He's a contract-to-hire employee, so until they hire him on as a full time employee with benefits, he has no sick days.  If he has to take a day off, he loses the income for that day, which motivates him to work through the illness.

The same goes for me when I'm sick, although as a freelancer and a self-employed person, I get paid a little differently (by what I accomplish, rather than hourly).  And honestly, that difference often means that I'm not motivated to work, unless I have a pressing deadline that can't be postponed, because I tend not to be very focused when I'm sick.

Speaking of my focus, that has been suffering today too, I'm afraid.  I was hoping to be productive while "stuck" at home from my canceled ride, but instead I haven't accomplished much that I had intended to do.  I don't know if it's because I'm getting sick, but I haven't had any energy or motivation today.  Sometimes I feel fine, and other times I think that maybe I'm feeling a little bit off.  I guess only time will tell.

Covid as a Freelancer

One of the things covid has really thrown into sharp relief is the failure of our job market to provide reliable benefits such as sick time.  For the most part, middle and upper class employees don't have to worry about this, as they generally work jobs that provide paid sick leave (or enable working from home, when someone is contagious but not too sick to work).  It's hourly employees and freelancers who have had to deal with the impact of illness when paid sick days are not available.

Yes, this is on my mind because finally, after nearly 2.5 years since it first shut everything down, I got covid.

I had a fairly mild case, as far as covid cases go, and yet it still wiped me out.  I was congested and coughing just a little, but the fatigue itself was anything but mild.  My husband and I felt symptoms coming on Wednesday night, and quickly went into full sick mode, conserving our energy for the only things that mattered: feeding my horse and the house pets, basically.  We alternated going out to the barn to feed Panama as much as possible so that we could both get enough sleep, and in that manner, slept basically all day Thursday and Friday.  We barely even ate.

Saturday was the first day of any improvement, when I was able to stay awake for about eight hours instead of immediately crashing again as soon as I was done feeding Panama.  Yesterday, Sunday, saw a little bit of a backslide, as I napped again in the afternoon and early evening, after dragging myself out to the barn to feed.

Once again, I am incredibly grateful for my clients.  The same clients who were understanding when Panama was sick were also patient when I couldn't get a couple of articles done last week.  I kept thinking I'd be able to, but kept having to put them off.  Fortunately my clients allowed me the extra time, no questions asked.  I was able to get a little caught up by working a bit over the weekend when I felt well enough.  I've been moving a little slow today, but have been able to get enough done that I'm pretty satisfied with the day.  I have to remind myself not to expect pre-covid productivity, though, just something that's better than the last few days.

I'm trying to prioritize so that I can get the most important things done while still giving myself sufficient time to rest.  A lot of friends have been warning me about the hazards of pushing yourself too soon when recovering from covid.  Apparently it can delay getting better and may even contribute to rebound covid.  I definitely don't want that!

Sick days as a freelance writer

I got sick over the weekend, and despite getting a lot of sleep, it's been hanging on this week.  I think it's probably because I went back to my usual schedule, in which I only get around seven hours of sleep a night -- not really enough if I'm fighting an illness at the same time.

When it started on Friday, I thought it was just a cold, but then on Saturday I was fairly sure I had a fever.  I didn't get my hands on a thermometer until I had already taken an ibuprofen, but I still had a low fever at that time, so I'm guessing it had been higher before.

I slept most of the weekend, but yesterday I had to go back to my usual schedule, thinking I'd be better.

From post-con coma to con crud

I apologize for not having posted about AnomalyCon yet as I'd promised after the con ended, but I've been down and out with a sore throat and some minor congestion.  It doesn't sound like much, but it's a pretty substantial sore throat, and the entire illness has been making me feel pretty tired.  I actually think I felt it coming on Friday morning, so it probably isn't really "con crud," but a friend of mine used that term and I liked it so much I decided to appropriate it anyway.

It's supposed to be a vacation of sorts for me, and I'm spending the first few days of it sick, which seems somehow familiar -- I think I've been through this before.

Sick week

Despite all the promises of the coming week -- a week with nothing to do except to settle in to my new freelancing schedule and maybe see my horses a little too -- I got nothing done.  Why, you ask?

Well, this time at least it wasn't my fault.  It was because I got sick.

And not just a little sick.  Really, ridiculously sick.  Sick as in "I hardly left my bed all week."

Sick days: Hiccups in productivity

I've been pretty sick the last few days.  It came on slowly, but it was so bad when I woke up Sunday morning that I ended up going back to bed and sleeping for most of the day.  I have a severely sore throat, swollen lymph glands in my neck, and a low fever, so it's nothing to sneeze at (haha), either.