What Do You Leave At The Door When You Walk Into Work?

Well, I haven't written a post since mid-December...and that's very unusual for me. Right now I am typing with one hand because I fractured my elbow and had surgery - so I've been a bit out of it for a while.

Today is my first day back - and I am certainly not leaving my problem with my elbow at the door - that would be impossible to do. It affects how I feel, how I do my work, how well I concentrate....and it certainly impacts those around me who need things from me.

But this is just a fractured elbow. And I don't have to hide WHY I fractured it....and I am not afraid to go home at night.

What about when a person is dealing with domestic violence? As I often say, that does not stay at the door when a person goes to work, either. 

The costs at work?  Here are just a few:

• A 2005 national telephone survey by the Corporate Alliance to End Partner Violence (CAEPV) found that 21% of full-time employed adults were victims of domestic violence and 64% of them indicated their work performance was significantly impacted.
• In February of 2008, the CDC released the most comprehensive US survey regarding intimate partner violence – 23.6% of women and 11.5% of men reported at least one lifetime episode of intimate-partner violence.
• According to the CDC, intimate partner violence victims lose a total of nearly 8.0 million days of paid work a year—the equivalent of more than 32,000 full-time jobs—and nearly 5.6 million days of household productivity as a result of the violence.
• The cost of domestic violence to the US economy is more than $8.3 billion. This cost includes medical care, mental health services, and lost productivity (e.g., time away from work).
• Domestic violence coming to the workplace accounts for 24% of workplace violence incidents (Bureau of Labor Statistics, October 2006)
• The annual cost of lost productivity due to domestic violence is estimated as $727.8 million, with over 7.9 million paid workdays lost each year.
• The costs of intimate partner violence exceed $5.8 billion each year, $4.1 billion of which is for direct medical and mental health care services, xii much of which is paid for by the employer.

Fortunately we have resources to help enlightened employers at www.caepv.org.
 
What do you leave at the door when you walk into work? For victims of domestic violence, unfortunately they can no more leave the impact of abuse at home than I can this unusable arm.
 
That's clear to me - what about you?