Though she’s worked hard and gotten an MBA, she’s starting to think about finding work that is also good for her soul and her body. She’s concerned too. She’s not sure what to tell prospective employers about this jagged fork in her career road, or just how she’ll make it all work. She reminded me how important it is to share our stories, and to talk to someone who understands.

Some of what she told me reminded me of an article I wrote years about 8 years ago in which I chronicled the highlights of the first 8 years of my journey figuring out life with Crohn’s Disease. Having come from years of training in which the predominant thought was “you create your life,” I had a very interesting time reconciling this new body reality with that premise, and so I sought all sorts of remedies in the pursuit of health. I share it with you today, uncensored.

JOURNAL ARTICLE – What Can Your Health Tell You About Your Career?

Until 1992 I had been, by all accounts, healthy. I am sharing my story with you in hopes that you can use it to make a difference in your own life.

In 1992 I suddenly developed a severe gastrointestinal illness, Chrohn’s disease, which can be very debilitating. The cause of the disease is unknown, and there is no “cure.” This is my eighth year with Chrohn’s and I have been completely symptom free for 7 months, without taking any medicine.

7 months is not forever, but I can tell you this wellness comes with a certain degree of confidence. (While I tell you this, I mentally knock on wood and give thanks, and probably will for the rest of my life.)

My illness has been a tremendous teacher. I have used it to learn about my values, where my integrity’s been out, and to make choices more truly aligned with who I am, and what I am here for.

I had met and heard about people who were far more disabled by this disease than I ever was, and others who claimed to had gotten rid of it. When I fell ill, I vacillated between feeling lucky it wasn’t worse, and feeling like a victim, not so masterful after all. I learned that we each have our own process and learn our lessons in our own time. Click here to read the rest.

Joan

P.S. Have you caught Rosalind’s Virtual Tour? Check it out now.

Next stops:

• Wed Nov 12 – despite lupus, asked me to respond to this question: Why do you give so much attention to the issue of talking about chronic illness and do you think this is more difficult for women than men?

• Thursday Nov 13 – Fighting Fatigue asked me for to write about raising a family, working and living with chronic illness. I offered one “big idea”- a strategy – that I found really helped us.

• Thursday Nov 13 -Yes, we’re appearing on two sites in one day! Read a review of the book on Stuff and Nonsense.

• Friday Nov 14 – My Life Works Today — I’m writing in response to a reader’s question: What happens when you’re too sick to work?
• Friday Nov 14 - Getting closer to myself interviews me asking such questions as: what do I think about the universal issues women with chronic illness face, what should women in their 20′s & 30′s be thinking about as they look ahead and what can women do as a group to face these issues.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

As Joan Rivers so famously said, “Can we talk?”

Neither Joan nor I earn money from this blog. We each have other blogs, primarily directed toward our separate businesses and neither of us earns money – at least directly – from those blogs either. You might ask, so why do we bother?

Well, as we set out to write and publish the book, Women, Work and Autoimmune Disease: Keep Working, Girlfriend!,  we thought a blog would give us feedback on our ideas. Although we don’t get many comments, and usually they’re affirming, we thought that at least it’s a way to let people know about the book.

But we could do that with a newsletter and, at the least, in our websites. A blog is intended to get reader interaction.

YOU CAN COMMENT. And we welcome your thoughts, even more so when people don’t agree with us or each other. (As long as you don’t get nasty of course).

Early this week, I posted a column on my other blog, WorkingWithChronicIllness, about the current presidential campaign Sarah Palin’s stand on chronic illness. The post is, Sarah Palin’s stand on chronic illness. Only two sentences directly mention Palin — and I did cite an article written by Gloria Steinem about her which is negative about Palin. Two thirdsof the post is more generally about the fact that chronic illness is simply never mentioned any campaign speech or literature. And why this election should matter to people with chronic illness. The last two paragraphs urges people to vote for the democratic ticket.

The post hasn’t gotten a single comment. But, there was reaction. Four people unsubscribing with this reason: offensive, strongly disagree or disapprove. And one of those persons unsubscribed from this blog as well for the same reason. No one has ever unsubscribed for that reason.

Now, I don’t blame anyone for responding negatively to what I say. Quite the contrary. I don’t think I’m “right” – I’m just trying to stir things up so people talk about chronic illness more — and don’t sweep it under some rug.

I’m glad to see that people read what I write. And think about what I say. But hey, voice your thoughts and opinions — so we can have conversation — and stimulate more.

I can’t help but wonder, Do people worry that if they post, someone at work might find out that they have a chronic illness and “out them”?

If so, what a shame. What a bad world we live in that we have to work so hard to hide an important part of who we are. But, hey, I do know that’s a fact of life. So why not use another name – a pseudonym?

So please, let’s talk about it.

Rosalind aka cicoach.com

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

We’ll also talk about why it’s a woman’s issue and some of the particular concerns for women in the workforce.

If you’d like to attend and have a chance to say hello and ask questions, too, you can! There’s no charge to attend. Just visit Futures in Motion to register. I’d love to meet some of you who we’ve only been able to write to through our blog.

=================

Notes

A special thanks to the author of How to Cope with Pain for her fabulous review of
Women, Work and Autoimmune Disease: Keep, Working, Girlfriend!

Anecdote: here’s a great example the incremental value of your network and support team. I’ve met Markell in person. As is rarely the case these days, she actually lives in the same County I do. I first met Rosalind by telephone about 3.5 or so years ago. I’ve been working with my Virtual Assistant (VA), Angee Robertson, for 6 years. Angee introduced me to Rosalind way back when, and it turns out that Angee is also Markell’s VA. Wild, huh? How has your network worked it’s magic for you?

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The dictionary definition iDictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) – dis·clo·sure

In light of chronic illness, disclosure refers to the act of telling another that you live with a chronic illness.

I thought Joan’s blog post last week (No Hardfast Rules about Disclosure) so important that I led my readers from my other blog, Working With Chronic Illness, straight to that post.

I got a comment that I have to share because it fills in the picture even more. I’m pasting it here:

Christina Gombar on Aug 28th, 2008 said:

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The choice to disclose your illness during the interview process has to be a personal decision. There is no way we could possibly tell you what is right or wrong as there are too many variables. You’re not required to voluntarily disclose. You are required to answer interview questions as honestly as possible. Your potential employer is allowed to ask you questions to find out if there is anything that would prevent you from performing the tasks of the job for which you are applying.

“Job Relevance is the Key Factor.” From an article on monster.com: …interview questions should be designed to determine a candidate’s capability to perform the essential functions defined for the job. An interviewer is required to couch their inquiries in job-relevant language, and not to make assumptions about a candidate’s ability or disability. If you want to read more about what an employer may or may not do, read the full article, How to Interview Candidates, Part 3: Legal Interview Questions and Hiring Guidelines.

What about you, the candidate? I’m fairly certain it’s not necessary nor wise to start out your interview by introducing your illness too: “Hello, I’m Joan Friedlander and I have Crohn’s Disease?” It may be absurd to suggest you would ever do that, but the guilt and worry might make you want to just get it out of the way.

In our book, Rosalind wrote out some good ideas and guidelines about disclosure during the interview process (page 117). I think there is a lot of merit to her suggestion that if you decide it’s important to disclose that you do what you can to wait until the job offer stage, and only, again, when you have reason to know that you’ll need accommodations of some sort. If you chose not to disclose during the interview, you’ll do better if you have some plans for how you’ll handle disclosure if you’re ability to do your job changes. You can get help with that in Women, Work and Autoimmune Disease.

I confess I never disclosed on an interview because I only looked for a new position when I was well, and nothing was preventing me from doing my job at that moment. In addition, I didn’t understand what I was actually living with for some time because I went in to remission for almost 3 years after my first round of symptoms subsided. By the time another flare up came around I had 2 more jobs under my belt.

Later, when I had a clearer understanding of my situation, it was still quite likely that I could be in remission for months at a time. How could I say, “I should be ok for 10-12 months, but then I’ll probably have to go out on disability for a bit?” Do you think this was the wrong choice?

Here I am again, 3-plus years in remission. If I were to decide to go back to work for a company, do I know that I would become ill again? I don’t. I’m smarter about my situation, and I believe I’d handle disclosure differently if I felt it was important for the job ahead of me. Of course, now that we have the Internet a quick search would take a potential employer to this blog. Drat! I’d better get back to my marketing.

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

This last Monday, we had another opportunity, except this was a pre-planned interview. Dr. Terri Orbuch, “The Love Doctor,” spent an hour with us. She was lovely, professional and very warm in her approach. You can listen live on VoiceAmerica at 8 am Pacific time on Monday, August 11th.

BOOK SIGNING IN ORANGE COUNTY, CALIFORNIA – MEET JOAN ON AUGUST 23RD

In our book, I included some personal stories about my journey, which is without a doubt intimately shared by my son. I became ill when having the time of my life working for Brentano’s bookstore as a training manager, and my son was 7. Now he’s 23 and working at a local Barnes and Noble. When he found out the date our book would be published he approached the Customer Relations Manager at his store to suggest bring me in for a book signing, without any prompting or request from me. Wow. So many, many reasons this is a Wow…last week I went into the store, and there the book was, in a stack with a poster announcing the event.

If you happen to live in the area, I hope you’ll come on by. I’ll lead a short discussion about this challenge we’re all dealing with, and, of course, sign copies of the book. Click here to download the flier with all details..

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

He then told me that his Mom had fibromyalgia – news to me – and had to go out on disability leave as her health deteriorated. While she was out she got so much better that the day she reported back to work, she turned in her resignation. He didn’t give me any more of the back story, only said that the difference in her health away from work compared to on the job was so drastic she felt she’d be able to maintain her health if she didn’t return to that job. She has.

He also told me that at one point his mom did consider starting a business but by then her husband was getting ready to retire so launching something at that time of their life didn’t make sense to her.

Our conversation turned to health insurance, always the biggest negative factor when deciding about self-employment. Now that both his parents are “retired” they’re paying for their own health insurance. It costs them about $1000/month for just her portion of their coverage. That sounds about right to me.

Clearly, his Mom chose well-being over working for health coverage, and even without knowing their specific circumstances I think it’s safe to say that she had the option to make this choice, as aggravating at that insurance cost may be.

My friend’s story reminded me about the issues Rosalind discussed in her chapter, “Diagnosis, Disease Course and Career Development.” Your decisions about your options regarding work are influenced by so many factors, and there is no one answer. The variables that impact your decision about working include family and marital status, where you are in your career development as well as your career aspirations – or not – and your actual health at any particular time. My friend’s Mom, unlike many women who develop autoimmune illnesses, became ill fairly late in life so her choices and options were different than if she’d been in her 20′s.

Joan

P.S. If you live in California and belong to a group or organization where a discussion of self-employment as an option would benefit the members, please write me through my web site, www.lifeworkpartners.com/contact .

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Keep in mind, she specializes in specific industries and professions, so I don’t pretend that she is in touch with all levels of employment. In her own words, “I work primarily in certain industry sectors and not all. I suspect there is a variance in how this issue is being addressed – with some industries or even companies within those industries still more forward thinking than others.”

Q. When you’ve interviewed candidates for positions, have any told you about ongoing health issues or do they keep quiet?

A. Well if they’ve kept mum – I sure don’t know about it but yes, I’ve had candidates disclose either current, past or recent past health issues (some are chronic and some what I would call health events).

Q. If people do disclose something to you, might you still forward them for an interview, or do you outright “reject” them?
(This is probably a question she could only answer the way she did as I know it’s not OK to outright reject a candidate. I thought her answer informative regarding the expense a company might have to account for in their budget for appropriate accommodations.)

A. The only factors that I use to determine the validity of a candidate’s candidacy is are they qualified and equipped to do the job that is required. If someone would need accommodation that would far exceed their ability in comparison with other candidates, or would present an expense attached to a position that could not budgeted for – I imagine that would be limiting. Otherwise, I am focusing on the technical skills and cultural fit.

Q. If you do recommend them, do you let the company know about health concerns, and/or counsel the candidate about how to approach the topic?

A. If someone needs accommodation to leave early twice a week for doctor’s appointments – I would probably encourage them to address their needs with the hiring manager fairly early on.

Q. Have you noticed any trends in the companies you’re working with to make accommodations for candidates they’re really interested in hiring if they reveal a health issue? Is this even discussed, or is it still hush-hush?

A. I haven’t seen any trends that I can acknowledge – other than Human Resources [HR] working more as a business partner with managers. When HR is more embedded in the business in general, I think there’s an ability to do overall “just in time” training on many issues including these.

5. If a someone is interested in a position, can do the job, has a history of unpredictable illness symptoms, what advice would you give her?

A. Be an active listener, before you talk. Disclosure is I imagine an important aspect of coping with an illness – but understanding the pacing of when it is appropriate to address – is really vital. Too early, and it seems like “too much information” – too late – and it seems like “why didn’t he/she mention this sooner?”

I think she’s quite right about this last. I know I’ve been caught with ‘wrong’ timing with this a couple of times. I suppose it’s a bit like dating and disclosing. It’s not the first thing out of your mouth, and knowing the right time isn’t always easy. I like her suggestion to be an active listener.

Finally, she offered this last tip. “The “bible” I work with every year is the Fortune issue with the “Best Companies to Work for” – this list to me would probably represent the very best example across industries of “who gets it”.”

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

I admit I had not given much thought to the fact that some women who have to work may not see their work through the lens of having a career, though looking back through my 21 jobs I know I often wondered what my career path was.

Some women, no matter how ill, don’t have the choice to work or not to work – I never felt I did. For about half of the time I was ill I was also a single mom. Even when married, not working has never been an option.

I filed for divorce from my second husband within a year of the onset of my Crohn’s diagnosis. I did this just a few months after I was demoted from my training manager position with the company I’d worked for longer than any other, and from a job I loved. (I was 37 and on my 3rd “career” by then.) I was demoted because my illness and hospital stays made it very difficult to keep up with the responsibilities of managing my store, and it was showing.

Before my divorce was final, I got another job, one I hoped would put me back onto the path I’d started before I was demoted. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I hated the company I worked for. I stuck with it for just over a year, and then sought out and was offered a position as an executive assistant to the owner of a local company. During that entire time – for about 2-and-a-half years – my symptoms were in remission. However, a year into my new office position I was “let go,” just a day after returning from 10 days of disability leave.

It took 5 more years and 3 more jobs before I decided to start my coaching business. Because of the impact my illness had I my career, and my decision to go out on my own, I wrote chapter 7, “You’re Fired – By Your Body or Your Boss,” in which I discussed self-employment as an option.

My post today is not meant to argue against the concerns that have been raised about the focus of our book, and our point of view. I just don’t think we’re all that unique. Rather, I think my story – and Rosalind’s – is typical of the ups and downs, and stops and starts women living with autoimmune diseases experience.

The question still remains, what can we do with this hand we’ve been dealt? There’s no question that there are as many answers as there are women.

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Rosalind and I wrote this book to start a conversation, and to support women with autoimmune illnesses who want to continue to stay in the work force. On a larger scale, we’d like to assist companies that want to keep talented people in the workforce who happen to also live with the unpredictability of an autoimmune disease.

There is the start of a trend in this direction, with some organizations investing in comprehensive wellness programs, some which include follow-up coaching for as long as a year. The Center for Preventive Medicine and Mayo Clinic Health Solutions both offer services to work with such companies. Unfortunately, at least as far as I can tell, the emphasis is still on more easily detectable and preventable chronic illnesses.

I hope that our book will give you ideas and courage to continue working – if you want to – and some tools to start to raise awareness and interest, even if only with your current employer.

Joan

Bookmark It

Hide Sites