How to Take the Perfect Mental Health Day

It’s one of the best ways to stay functional

Ashley Laderer
Elemental

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Credit: Westend61/Getty Images

IIt’s Tuesday morning. It feels like you’ve dealt with an entire workweek and you’re already drained. You’re on your third coffee which is giving you heart palpitations and by 10 a.m. you feel like crying at your desk. You can’t concentrate on a single thing because you’re distracted by how miserable you feel.

Sound familiar? You’re not sick, but you need a day off.

Regardless if someone has a mental health condition or not, everyone deserves mental health days to take time to relax and recharge. While allotted mental health days aren’t universally offered, society is making strides, at least when it comes to students: This year, Oregon passed a bill allowing students to take five mental health days in a three month period. Some companies offer mental health days, but it’s not the standard.

In today’s culture, employees feel the need to work hard constantly. Staying late at the office to work on projects is the norm, as is scarfing down a sad desk lunch instead of taking an actual lunch break. It’s no wonder 2019 was the year the World Health Organization officially recognized burnout as an “occupational phenomenon,” defining it as “a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been…

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Ashley Laderer
Elemental

writer aiming to make people with mental health conditions feel less alone 🦄 it’s okay to be not okay. instagram + twitter @ashley_unicorn