2023 WEEK 37: Medical Benefits

I didn't think much of "employee benefits" back in the day, when I was working in a regular job. Being young and naive, I cared more about leave days, the pay, and the contents of the pantry. 

I never used much of my paid medical leave and even felt somewhat proud about being so "healthy". More fool me. Such robustness benefits the employer more than employee. Health insurance was naturally not a concern either. People at my previous workplace were upset about the lack of coverage and "fought" to have our GP bills covered up to $35. For my part, I didn't see much point in going to the doctor as long as I could WFH whenever I wasn't well.

How things change when you get older and poorer! Now that I work in a part-time job I have no such benefits - no paid medical leave, no health insurance, no bill reimbursements. Yet of course I need these very things like never before. I work in a crowded public place and am exposed to countless bugs daily - including covid - and have fallen sick an unprecedented number of times in the past year of working in retail.

When I'm sick, as I am this week, it goes without saying that I don't have the option of working from home. I have to miss work, meaning I don't get paid. 

The HR department demands an MC in such cases even though they don't reimburse part-timers' doctors' bills - a highly unreasonable practice, in my book*. One time I went to the polyclinic just to get an MC - I left without collecting the medicine because I didn't want to pay (or wait) any more. That cost me $15 out of my pocket - that's on top of the $40 I lost from not attending work.

For a while I was perturbed by this incident and what it says about my life. How have I - a degree-holder with a respectable 10 years of careering "under my belt" - ended up like this, pretending to be not-sick so that I didn't have to pay my own medical bills? (Then again, I didn't realise I had a school email the entire time I was in uni, so I missed freshmen orientation week and my graduation ceremony. Maybe it's all in character.)

But I guess I've made my peace with it. Just like the reduced income, the lack of medical benefits is the price I pay for the flexibility and freedom of part-time work. I'm learning to be "responsible for my own health" (lol - good training for Singapore citizens). I have to accept that it's an unpaid part of my job to care for my body and be more hygienic and all that other boring shit. 

All this and I still would not trade in my life for a full-time white-collar job just yet...

* My workaround: text my boss at least 1 day ahead and ask him to push back my next work day(s). Luckily he's flexible and nice enough to accommodate.

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Anyway, I think this week's stomach bug is largely the fallout from last week's hectic schedule including the extraordinarily stressful stint at the commercial dog groomer's (which I have yet to write about!!). That, and my poor diet of late. I hadn't been cooking much at all - and cai png does not make a healthy diet, I regret to say. 

Good things this week: swimming, cooking (simple fare like potatoes with yogurt, but still!), Wheel of Time getting better, sorting out our Chiang Mai trip next month, lots of reading.

Mon: run, write, 2-6 work, Wheel of Time
Tue: lunch with parents, 2-6 work, Only Connect & Elementary
Wed: (fell sick) 2-6 work, staggered home
Thu: lunch with dad, read at McDonald's!!!, Wheel of Time
Fri: swim, travel planning, writers meetup, Decathlon
Sat: swim, write, interview housesitters, dinner & lunch at home, Wheel of Time
Sun: yoga, 2-6 work, dinner at home, Wheel of Time

I just wanted to show off the shoe cabinet that I rescued from the dumpster. It was in good condition except the doors were rubbish on account of being made of sawdust. I just took off the bad doors. Now it's a place for things to grab as you run out of the door.