Illness from work caused by work related pressure

The Equality Act isn't only applicable in some situations and not others, therefore you are entitled to adjustments right now and your employer is breaking the law refusing to discuss these with you. If I was in your situation I'd be looking at the following;

1.Getting an advocate to support conversations with your line mananger - I'd also look at an A2W report as its an external disability specialist who will discuss what RA would be helpful

2.Self referring to OH

2. Raising a formal complaint and following this up the chain if you get no where with 1 and 2

If you are being asked to carry out extra teaching hours you should be being paid the extra as this role is on a completely different scale to your tec role. 

Employees take advantage in this was as they're used to getting away with it. If you choose not to put up with this then it sounds like you will have to have numerous challenging conversations and fight for your rights. The ACAS helpline are very good at advising on employment rights.

I think you need to look for advice from people who successfully managed a similar situation and rework, rethink it for yourself.

Your stress seem to come from the fact that there is a clash of two jobs. You might discuss how the expectations of the technical job are reduced when you teach instead, so it wouldn't trigger you, so you would know it's not a problem and how you will handle that. That means that the deadlines of the technical job would be pushed back etc, but you still would do it.

Another thing is to understand clearly what is affecting your wellbeing. It seems it is last minute unexpected changes. Maybe the reasonable adjustment should be giving your a week's notice or put some parameters, limits to what can be asked of you, so it would not be unexpected for you, you would expect that something would come up.

More broadly, you might consider reading the equality act and thinking how it applies to you, how you could use it.

The adjustments recommended off-the shelf by somebody else based on other people's circumstances might not work. This is why your employer rejects the adjustments from your GP. They see it as relating to long sickness. You need adjustments for your work. Not the return to it.

You might review why are you asking to get your hours back? Is that simply the anxiety reaction to the unexpected request? In that case you might be better off by focussing on sorting out adjustments to make requests more foreseeable and more manageable. And agreeing that it should not put an extra pressure on your other job, that is it would wait a little, within delivering the same results.

Not focussing on getting hours back. There is no inherent equality act significance to requesting those hours back. If other people are doing extra hours unpaid, and it is legitimate within your contract, you cannot argue it is discrimination. You need to pick your battles and target them well.

NAS62204 said:

but the bottom line is I am already so coiled up I am almost certain I will react badly when I go in in the morning

Is your medication effective? You need to get out of this cycle. Separate the triggers and red hearings from your real needs. Focus on needs.

You need adjustments for visibility and predictability, so you can stay calm.

I have rarely been off in the five years I've been there. The head is lovely but also good at putting you in your place. She said she won't put any special measures in place for me as I'm not off enough to require special measures. I think its tricky really, because the situations I end up in may be more so in one year compared to the next. They are also fully aware of the medicine I take if I need to, no risk assessment done on that as far as I know. I tell them I've taken it, and I carry on working in a semi functional state. 

I'm rarely triggered while teaching, in fact never. My other job entails certain people to speak to me in a way teachers would never be spoken to. My strategies are to go to a quiet place and shut the door, or have a good old rant to a trusted colleague. Some of my closer working colleagues can tell when I've been triggered which is good as they can intervene.

My biggest trigger is having lessons thrust upon me with little notice, in a time when I am paid to do a completely different job. Union and rep are aware of it, but right now we are simply monitoring the situation.

Luckily our children are generally nice, and I teach an exciting subject so behaviour management isn't a big issue, but I do ask for someone to be in with me if I have had to take medication.

My diagnosis and the GP letter is in my file, so I guess if anything were to happen they can't say they haven't been warned.

Not that anyone told me, but apparently someone else is not going to do what I was not told I was doing, so crisis averted 'this time'. But I imagine if I hadn't been told, I would have been so off kilter by the morning I would have been triggered and therefore off work.

Hey!

I’m a teacher in a secondary school and I had a meltdown back in November. 

Have the school completed a risk assessment with you? They should have done if you have been off for a prolonged period of time. There should be strategies in your risk assessment to help you manage any triggers.

Also, have you been in contact with your union? Do you have a union rep at school? 

:)