Millions of Britons are not working due to illness. Three of them tell i what it's like to have to stop the job you want to keep
In December 2013, Danny Reyntiens was working three jobs to try and make ends meet. Aged 39, his passion was acting, but he was working in hospitality, call centres and data entry to pay the bills. He was burned out and barely sleeping as a result, and that week, on a shoot for a short film, he found he couldn’t remember his lines. Soon afterwards, he got kicked out of his flat because he couldn’t afford the rent. “That was the week before I tried to end my life,” he explains.
Mr Reyntiens find such statements “scary”. he adds: “The Government says, ‘You’re lazy. You don’t want to work. You’re just using mental health as an excuse.’ But mental illness is a hell. Being stuck at home is not fun, and now they’re treating us like criminals.” “We are open to exploring whether the GP is the most appropriate person to be issuing fit notes, given the workload and workforce pressures currently facing general practice.”
Unlike Mr Reyntiens and Mr McIver, Mphango Simwaka, 25, who lives in London, found herself signed off sick in the early days of her career. At 24, she had just started working as an associate consultant for an equality and diversity firm. She’d been working from her hometown of Bradford but was planning to move to the capital.
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