Sacked for almost dying
Eh-up,
Back in 2004 my career was on the up. I'd finished my MSc the previous year, I'd developed a big fat (and very successful) campaign for a student group, I'd written a paper for a professional association and I'd done a couple of presentations at conferences. All I needed was a proper job.

Yeah, I was a smug wotsit, I'll confess.

Said job presents itself, as an environmental consultant in a small outfit near Bath. This was pretty good for myself and my girlfriend (now fiancee) as she could easily find herself a job teaching English as a foreign language there.

The first Thursday morning I was there, I developed a weird rash on my hands and felt a bit ill. I thought it was related to the heat, as it was damn hot at the time. I cooled off in the shade, had some water and was alright soon enough.

The next morning I had turned bright pink, like a cooked lobster.

I returned to work on the Monday, having barely eaten.

Over the course of the next two weeks, my skin started to fall off, I could not concentrate, my whole body started to swell (steady!) and I couldn't recognise myself in the mirror. My hair stated to fall out too.

I looked like Swamp Thing's uglier brother.

Eventually, I was near-delirous. I was "let go" - read fired for being ill - on the third Friday of working for this lot.

I was hospitalised the next Monday.

It took me four months to recover.

I didn't work again for another four months.

I had a very, very nasty reaction to medicine I was taking. Such is life.
( Parmesan Quality b4 Quantity, Thu 23 Feb 2006, 21:30, Reply)