Published on 12, July, 2020
Recently diagnosed and first time posting! Hello!
I am having difficulty at work in so many ways and desperately want to keep working. One is the main things I really am struggling with at the moment being able to use a headset for meetings and things over teams as I get so distracted by background noise around me, get really overwhelmed and then cannot focus or concentrate, so I loose my ability to engage in a conversation which is obviously really affecting me. I spoke to IT department today about getting a noise cancelling headset but been told anything like that has to go through HR as a reasonable adjustment and would have to provide medical evidence etc I don’t know how I feel about being open about my diagnosis at work and how it affects me. Any experience with this? Positive or negative? anyone tried a noise cancelling headset? Did it help? Any other suggestions to try? thanks!
Unfortunately, i don't have any experience myself, but i think they're right and that it would need to be put through as reasonable adjustments. I wonder if you would be able to talk to the reasonable adjustments people yourself and explain that you aren't ready to disclose your condition but would like to be able to acquire the headphones via reasonable work adjustments??
i don't know too much about this so im sorry if that wasn't helpful
Thankyou for replying. I don’t know if I disclose it to HR that would then spiral into other people knowing like my manager? I have worked there for five years now, so I would hope that it would be a positive experience letting them know my diagnosis, but it really worries me too. i think I’m going to have to do something as it’s interfering with me being able to work. It wasn’t an issue the last few years but now more and more people are back in the office it’s so much noisier and busier.
thanks!