Hi There,

Your first priority right now is to get better, everything else is secondary to that. If your doctor recommends you to take time off, then that is exactly what you must do.

Now concerning your sick leave - this will not have any major financial effect on your employer, because during sick leave your salary will be covered by some kind of insurance, so they will actually be saving money while you are on sick leave, almost the same as if they had terminated you! Yes it is true that they can not terminate you while on sick leave, but since it is really not costing them anything I doubt it will matter very much.

Stress related illnesses are much more common than you think and when recruiting it is not at all uncommon to come across people who have had these kinds of illnesses in the past. In fact, in some areas of banking, it would almost be unusual to find people who have not had issues in this area! So do not worry about it impacting your future job prospects - it will not! In fact I have never seen any employee reference where the employer discussed the employee's health record - I'm not even sure it would be legal.

On the bright side, perhaps by the time you have recovered, the storm will be over and you will be able to continue working for your present employer. Either way, pay attention to what I said earlier - first priority is to get better, so do what the doctor says.

Good luck with that,

Jim