Boss Approves of Employee Taking ‘Mental Health Day’

There is a post going viral on the internet that has everyone talking. It involves the following e-mail exchange between a woman named Madalyn and her boss, Ben:

That's right, Madalyn took a couple of "mental health days" off from her job and her CEO not only approved, but thanked her for bringing attention to mental health issues.

I posted that on Facebook and got a response seeing it in a way I really didn't think about:

As a person who struggles daily with mental health issues, I am honestly a little annoyed at this woman. I don't know the whole story, any of the people or what her job is like so I'm trying REALLY hard not to judge but two days PLUS the weekend for "mental health"???? C'mon now. I like that people are taking mental health more seriously but what happened to sucking it up and doing what ya gotta do??? I know from personal experience that there are days when it is a struggle to even get out of bed but you do it because you are a GROWN UP. Life is HARD and full of trials and struggles but you can't just ditch out and leave coworkers holding the bag because you are "burnt out". Why not take PLANNED days off and take a mini vacation instead of deciding the day of that ya just can't do it? I am genuinely concerned that our country's work ethic is on a serious downward slide!

Legitimate mental health issues are not something to make light of, but I think initially many of us would have thought Madalyn simply was doing what we all would like to do, and probably have, just taking a couple of sick days to ourselves to recharge our batteries.

My friend is right, if you're entitled to the days anyway, you shouldn't need an excuse. But sometimes you don't know you need a break until you do. It's great that the boss was so understanding about it. Knowing me, I'd feel so guilty about it that I'd end up going in.

But which side are you on? Madalyn's and her boss's, or my friend Courtney's in the quote above? Share your thoughts in the comments.