The notion of arduous work is one of the points of tension in the pension reform. Sandrine, housekeeper for four years, talks about her job with all sincerity. A profession where it is difficult to grow old without having “pain everywhere”.
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Today at 8:00 p.m.
Sandrine is 51 years old and is the mother of two grown children. With a degree in history, she had no professional experience when she found herself having to boil the pot. “I was looking for training when I met Carine and Olivier Janot – owners of a cleaning and cleaning company in Terville – who offered me a job”, explains Sandrine. And to admit in a breath: “I needed to work. Domestic help is not a choice, it’s a fallback job. Temporary that lasts”.
Four years later, the 50-year-old chained thirty-six hour weeks with no less than eleven different clients, individuals. A “routine” that has its advantages. But also its drawbacks. Because if the company for which she works regularly intervenes with its customers so that they equip themselves with appropriate equipment in order to save the gestures of domestic workers, the fact remains that six to eight hours of cleaning per day, over time, it’s tough. “The gestures are repetitive, we trample a lot, we bend over, get up, we rub, all of this is hard on the body. »
“At 64-65, girls are screwed”
Back pain, tendonitis in the shoulder, heavy legs, joint pain are part of Sandrine’s daily life. “The body takes a slap”, admits the housekeeper who remembers in particular having had to clean a veranda from top to bottom in the middle of a heat wave. “Getting old in this job seems difficult to me. I have pain that I didn’t have four years ago. And then there is the inhalation of the products, the infectious risks: we clean the toilets, the shower drains, we don’t know what we can find there. “At 64-65, girls are finished,” confirms Carine Janot, who oversees a team of twelve cleaners and housekeepers. Physically strenuous, the job is also morally so. “It’s a solitary profession with very few exchanges. Intellectually, this job does not nourish me, ”continues the history graduate. The pension reform and the postponement of the legal retirement age are not a subject that particularly animates him, “because at 50, we tell ourselves that we still have time to think about it”. Until then, his body will tell him to stop.
