Deciding about disclosure

One of the biggest problems facing a person with a diagnosis who wants to get a job is how much to tell about those tricky gaps in the CV. Of course it doesn't end with getting a job. If you decide to disclose your mental health problems to your employers at interview and still get the job, you then have to decide whether it is safe to confide in colleagues. What are the answers? How do you advise someone on what to do? User consultants Mo Hutchison and Mary Nettle have run workshops on these questions at ‘Wicked Issues’ conferences on mental health and employment. The approach they have taken is to think through the issues involved with the participants and to devise a list of questions that people need to ask themselves before making the decision for themselves. This short article does not therefore provide answers, but it does provide a starting point for thinking things through — and hopefully for more discussion within the columns of A life in the day.