Back to work and other things.

Back to normal now after yesterday, i went into work and arranged to attend an introductory course on neuro linguistic programming! on the 8th Feb....it may have earnt me brownie points with the new boss as it seems she is a practitioner herself.
Had two staff approach me today asking to move from day work to waking nights, both with solid childcare reasons for the change, not sure if they both know that they have asked me but with only one waking night post available i am going to need the wisdom of Soloman to work this out!
After work i came home and then headed out to the South bank to meet up with ex work colleagues. Just over a year ago we went through a big shake up as the company nearly folded. I had been working for a couple of years as a project manager, directly managing a service in camberwell and line managing two other services in Dulwich. I was told that i would need to return to my substantive post as care manager and four of my ops team colleagues decide to take redundancy, these were the ones i got on with best.  I then had to reapply for a new job or take redundancy too, i was gung ho for the redundancy for a good while but then there were niggles about my health this was four months before i was told the cancer had returned so i decided at the last minute i should apply for the new post of area manager which would mean managing 2 or 3 care homes instead of one.
I was successful but then told that i would have work miles from where i live which i found hugely irritating and annoying and so didn't want to manage the homes that i was being given. If ever a diagnosis could come at the right time my newly active tumour cells made their mark just when i needed them.
A week after i was told of my new houses i got the diagnosis and the information that i would need to go back onto chemo. The doctor was great and e mailed my boss to say that i couldn't possibly work so far from home whilst having treatment so they arranged to leave me where i was.....phew.
Taking on the new contract meant that i lost a lot of the terms and conditions i had bought with me a few years earlier when we were transferred over from being run by the local authority. I lost 6 days annual leave a year and my sickness entitlement changed dramatically, from 6 months full pay 6 months half to 40 days full pay 40 days half. I was lucky enough to still be on the 6 months full pay when i had my op and first round of chemo.
I started the chemo in the December and was due to finish in June, i went through my 40 days paid leave during that period and continued working where i could with provision to work at home too. Gradually as the time came for me to be back at work without having chemo the spectre of going to work in  Wandsworth raised it's head again. But then! an employee who i used to manage discovered that anyone who had a pension with Southwark, which i do must continue to work in Southwark, again timing could not have been better, instead of me pleading my case for not working further away i was asked if i minded taking on two houses in Dulwich, a ten minute drive from home! result.
That's where i work now, i manage two supported living services for people with severe learning disabilities. I enjoy the work and quite frankly am glad now that i am back in the services and working directly with tenants and staff. The organisation has changed dramatically and we are about to be taken over by another company. They are cancelling staff contracts and then offering them new posts for less pay and slightly more hours. Support workers are paid 8 pounds or so an hour, social care is being run into the ground, companies are bidding to provide support and in order to do this are reducing the price to gain the contracts. We know that commissioners are looking at price over quality when they take give out contracts. Driving down the cost of care then means that you cannot hire the people that you need to support people successfully. I was flabber gasted to find that Joe my son is being paid a comparable wage to stop people in the street and ask them to text a number to raise money for scope, it's difficult job but in no way comparable to that of a support worker who has to provide personal care, write complex reports, be aware of signs of abuse, write risk assessments, clean, do laundry, prepare for reviews, liaise with professionals, support tenants in the community, with medical appointments, deal with challenging behaviour in my homes case the risk of being scratched..i could go on.
Anyway i mentioned my line managers response to me being ill yesterday, incidentally this is someone i worked with 18 years ago when i was the deputy and he was a care officer, we have been friends for years but at work his approach irritates me enormously! Well the people that i met up with tonight would have been far more supportive as they were the first time i was ill, i was texting Patti from my bed keeping her informed of what was going on and her responses were encouraging and supportive and didn't make me feel that i wasn't valued and that getting better was the priority.
My previous boss and previous line manager met up tonight for a drink with three other people, one of whom still works in the company, funnily enough i was oncall tonight for the whole organisation and she was the second oncall! I recieved a call too which she was in a position to sort out with her knowledge of that part of the service.
It was great to see them and they have been in touch all through my treatment, Katie is four months older than me and as i came back from my first round of chemo she went off to have a mastectomy after finding a lump. She is fine three years on and continues to remember when i have had appointments and scans and always checks in by text to see how things are. Patti who was head of operations is one of the best managers i have ever worked with, knew everything that was going on worked like a trojan and also had great interpersonal skills, and brilliant at organising and getting projects going. Since she left it has all gone to the wall. She left after tragically losing her husband very quickly to lung Cancer he was 44 and died 5 months after diagnosis. He died just before his oldest son's career rocketed as a guitarist, he is the lead guitar on Plan B's album if anyone has the album on the back page there is a picture of his dad Simon {Patti's Husband} which Plan B put in as a tribute.
We had a great evening i arrived late as usual and missed the meal, afterwards we went to a pub opposite waterloo station. Was good catching up but makes me realise how much i miss working with them.