Workplaces function best when staff can speak openly about their struggles.

This employee tried to be transparent about their burnout.

But instead of receiving support, they were told not to talk about their grief.

So when their mental health worsened, they requested a leave of absence that affected the office’s productivity.

Check out the full story below for all the details.

Stop reporting about office burn out? Okay, done

My field of work has a high turnover and high burn out rate.

As a result, my company promotes transparent conversations with staff members.

This is to ensure we are all implementing self-care.

We are encouraged to take PTO as needed.

We are also encouraged to ask for managerial support when overwhelmed with tasks.

This person lost two family members, which caused their work to suffer significantly.

Last year, my work began to suffer.

I was struggling after losing two close family members suddenly.

I was transparent in hopes they would understand why I was withdrawn and had lower productivity.

My manager wrote me up as a result of my burn out.

Management instructed them to stop talking about burnout.

She cited that I was using our 1:1s inappropriately.

She said I was causing stress among the team with my grief.

She said I talked about being burnt out too much.

The write-up included every single 1:1 documentation of when I asked for help with burn out.

Management instructed me to stop talking about burn out.

They complied and eventually requested a leave of absence due to mental health reasons.

No problem.

I stopped bringing up burn out, being transparent, and asking for support.

About two months later, I requested a seven-week leave of absence.

I cited extreme burnout and mental health issues.

Management was shocked and angry that I did not tell them I was struggling or burning out.

They reminded the management that they were told not to talk about burnout.

I handed them a copy of my write-up and said:

“The action plan I received stated I could not talk about burn out anymore.”

Management was scolded for inadvertently creating a hostile work environment where staff couldn’t ask for support.

I got seven weeks off and partial pay.

They had to cover my job for the entire time I was out.

Let’s see how others reacted to this story.

Short and sweet.

This user shares their personal thoughts.

A manager speaks up about the issue.

This person shares the worst 18 months of their life.

Finally, here’s an honest opinion from this one.

If you silence burnout talk, don’t be surprised when it shows up in a much serious form.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.