So, I’m not entirely ready to start sending out resumes for a job. Almost, but still need to refine some of what I learned…it’s hard to remember everything when you worked with several different languages. Anyway I have a auto immune disease called Ulcerative Colitis. This thing has kicked my butt for almost two years now…I haven’t made any recovery progress in those two years…and with there being no cure the thing that scares me is how am I going to be able to function in a office?? I know companies can’t legally ask you or discriminate because of your health, but what if I don’t tell them I have a illness, and something happens, and I’m out for a week? What would they think that I didn’t tell them?
I would say that you should make them aware of your illness because omitting something that could affect your work performance would just give them an easy way to can you. I’m not going to tell you that it won’t affect your chances of landing a job, but it’s better to be up front. When you get flare ups, would you be able to work from home?
I’m not gonna lie it would be hard. My condition right now is severe, but I’m starting some new medicine soon. Hopefully that will lower my inflammation enough to at least work. As it stands right now, it would be difficult to work at home feeling like death.
What if you are completely healthy when they hire you and then you find out that you have that illness 1 year in? Do you expect a decent company to fire you?
what if it is a woman asking this question and then she gets pregnant?
I do not think disclosing illness in an interview is a good idea. That is the gist of what I’m saying. And what they think if you have to take time off is important, but it is not a unique situation to you. Everyone gets sick. Unexpectedly.
Sometimes bad things happen that makes us take time off that have nothing to do with us. (death or illness of family member for eg).
I’m not going to tell a company that I may need to take time off in the future. This is human frailty we are talking about and every company has human employees, so they will handle it.
(and if they don’t , then you can decide at that time to leave them but don’t discount yourself just because you are human).
Edit: as a counter-point to what I said, i found this article which suggests the opposite. Sharing it with you because you need to weigh all your options.
At most once you’re hired you will need to tell your manager what to expect but you don’t have to go into details.
Also consider remote work. I worked remote for years which helped with my own illness.
This is one of the reasons I’m pro unlimited vacation policies. You can just go when you need to and work how you need to.
Good points on both sides…like I said I’m not ready yet to be putting out resumes just yet. Hopefully by the end of next month I will be, but I still have no idea what to do lol. Of course someone is going to discriminate if I tell them, but on the other side it could look bad if I didn’t tell them knowing full well that this is a big issue.