Hi,
For bit of backstory, before Covid I was having meltdowns, well shutting down but never sure exact term to use and always easier with non autistic people to say meltdown I've found, at work probably once every week or other week, mainly due to lots of little things constantly annoying me until I couldn't take it anymore, like people not washing hands, interrupting with pointless announcements, people spending ages talking instead of working, come back late from things, making a mess in kitchen area, things being broken, and so on.
When Covid hit we could work from home full time and I've been fine while working since then, when it came to going back to work I asked for an occupational health assessment as I was still 1 of the best on the team in terms of speed and accuracy while working from home, but without the breakdowns. I'll need to try and find the report, but from what I remember my takeaway was that if it was essential to go in for some reason, which I can't see why it would be anyway, I would, but they are claiming they see it as theres no reason I can't go back.
Recently they declared they want everybody to go back 3 days a week, and those who refuse need to find other jobs, the manager of our section informed me today that this includes me, and if I wasn't willing to return 3 days a week I would need to find a new job. They don't seem to care about the fact that I was attempting to get work from home days before Covid due to the breakdowns, and while I've managed to convince them to arrange another occupational health meeting, I was told that they want me to "try 3 days a week for a few weeks" and then if that doesn't work try lowering it for a few weeks. However I know that not enough is going to have changed to prevent my breakdowns, and honestly I don't want to go back to having to sit frozen at my desk till a manager notices me, pull me away to ask questions I can't answer in that state for a while, before finally being able to get out and make my way home.
Has anybody else experienced this? If they hire a 3rd party company to do their occupational health assessments and they just deem you "fine to go in" do you have any recourse other than suffer more breakdowns until they accept it isn't good for you? This all just feels wildly unfair when at my end of year review I was told I am doing incredibly well on productivity and accuracy, so there is no work reason. I inquired in that meeting about promotions and was basically told "well you won't be able to probably without coming in 3 days a week", which stupidly as I don't want to give up on promotions I said I would be willing to try for a better job, and they are now using that say "well you said you'd do it for money so do it now". They've also tried to say as I mentioned we were thinking of going to Barcelona that "if you can go out and go on holiday then you should be fine", as if they are the same thing.
I know I could just suck it up and do the few months of breakdowns to prove it, but I honestly thought getting a diagnosis would help with things like this and mean I don't need to suffer for months to prove that yes, I have the kind of Autism that makes work from home preferable, but they really don't seem to care.
Thanks in advance.
