Being Dismissed Due to Ill-Health

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By Sarah-Jane Morphew

My mindset this week could have gone one of two ways. It could have gone down a really negative route, but thankfully I think this week has been a positive one. After a busy weekend of birthday treats for my eldest, including museum visits and restaurant treats, I had to face the meeting I have been waiting a long time for. The meeting of the dismissal committee of the governors.

Would I be dismissed due to ill-health? I didn’t have to attend this meeting but in the end I wanted to.

Being dismissed

So on Tuesday 3rd October 2017 (also my mother in law’s birthday) I was officially dismissed from my job due to ill-health. Before the meeting I had feelings of fear: what hoops are they going to make me jump through now? Will they actually do it? Is it the right thing? Will they say I’m well enough and may return to work or will they make me hand in my notice? Will it be a long meeting of questions I cannot answer again? All my fears thankfully were ill-founded. It was a really short meeting, 20 mins tops.

Basically, they went through the series of events, medical records etc., and explained this was why I was being dismissed. And that was that. You think I would be celebrating at that point and running out of the building with a joyful dance! Actually no…I sobbed.

I did not expect the emotional response that I had or that I’d feel so much like the rug had been pulled from under me. My security blanket, my safe place, my work family were now all gone. When the chair of governors thanked me for my service over the years, well that was it, breakdown. I would do one last walk around the buildings, and then that would be it.

Choosing not to plummet

I could have plummeted at that point; I could have really wallowed in the mourning of the last 9 years. But I chose not to. Rather I made a conscious decision to take some time to mourn the end of an era, the end of that phase of my life. I gave myself the chance to do that and then I was done. I thought to myself, ‘Right, door closed, what’s next? What door will open next?’ For once I didn’t have that fear of ‘What the hell am I going to do now?’ The fear of nothing. And the universe in its infinite wisdom did fill the void.

A couple of days later I was asked by my local day nursery if I wanted to be a relief worker, Doing a couple of hours a week. Here I mean a Pembrokeshire couple: not two, but somewhere between two and ten. Perfect. It suits me brilliantly. It’s the comfort of doing something that I know how to do but without certain aspects of the job that are less enjoyable — and more cuddles!

It’s a relaxed atmosphere with lovely staff who are fully accepting of my mental ill-health, my battles with balancing boys and work, and I still get time to be creative at home, have peace and quiet — occasionally time to ‘be’.

Masterpiece or work in progress?

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all rosy! I’ve been more tired, I’ve had less time to recharge, I haven’t got the balance right just yet. I’m a couple of weeks in now and I can feel it. I am getting less patient with the boys, dinners are getting more beige, there is shouting, there is a frazzled feeling, that feeling of being overwhelmed, creeping in.

I posted a quote the other day: ‘Some days I feel like a masterpiece and some days I feel like a work in progress.’ Today I am definitely a work in progress — there’s work to be done on me, but I’m working on it xx