Question about business travel

jasi704

So I'm a first time mom, and I'm due March 1. I have a HUGE (and I do mean HUGE) business trip that I take every year April 4-10. I know my boss will totally understand if I didn't make it on the trip, but I'm not sure if I want to miss out. It's kind of hard to explain without writing a novel about my job description, but basically this one week trip helps me do my job for the next 12 months. I'm an editor for a magazine, and I pretty much get 75% of my articles for the next year from this one business trip. So if I don't go, I'm ensuring that once I return from maternity leave, my job will be hell for a year. Plus, I'm pretty much the only one here that does what I do. So handing off that responsibility to someone else would be dangerous, especially because I'd still be the one taking over once I get back from maternity leave.

Have any of you working moms had anything like this happen to you? I'm terrified of leaving a one-month-old baby for six days. Especially if I'm breastfeeding, which I totally plan on doing. I know short-term it makes total sense to ditch the trip and be with my baby. But in the long-term, my career would suffer if I missed this trip. Is it stupid to even consider leaving a newborn for that long? Or is it possible? Maybe if I pump and freeze as much as I can before I go? Or even if I pump on the road and overnight my milk with a freezer pack? Or is that just totally ridiculous? Are there other things I should be considering besides just the breastfeeding situation? Other problems that might arise if I'm away from home for that long?

As far as who would be with my baby while I'm gone...my husband will be home, of course. And either my mother in law or my mom will stay at the house with him. So my husband would definitely have help if he needed it.

Any thoughts? I know most moms (at least those who I've spoken to) think I'm crazy for even considering this. But like I said, when thinking long-term about my job, it almost seems impossible for me to miss this trip. So if any of you could offer any insight or past experiences, that would help me a ton! Thanks.

cedenton

I think PPs made good points. You simply can't PLAN on going. So I would take this time to figure out a Plan B for your job.

I don't even think that taking LO with you is a good plan. You definitely don't want to screw up the nursing relationship and that could easily happen that early in the game. At 4 weeks he/she LO will probably have some episodes of cluster feeding in which they will want to be constantly attached at the boob and they probably won't be sleeping well at night. I don't think you'd be very productive at the meeting/conference.

jf198400

There is no way you can leave LO for so long at such a young age if you are BFing.period. The only way I can see even considering the trip is if LO comes too, with your DH to watch her. What will you be doing on the trip? If you are sitting and listening to a presentation and can nurse during it, then it might work.
Fwiw I was almost 2 weeks late with both of my children.

jasi704

Thanks for all your advice! Bringing LO is probably out of the question. It's kind of a unique trip. We travel from San Francisco and end up in Los Angeles by the end of the week. And we stay in a different city each night. It's a very, very busy week for me. So yea, even finding the time to nurse will be difficult. I would be on my feet a ton and be socializing from like 9am to 4pm everyday. And in between cities, I'll be in a car with four other people! Ugh...the more I think about it, the more it seems impossible

FemShep

I'm sorry, but I think that skipping the trip really does make the most sense. But since you know you won't be there, and you've clearly established a relationship with the trip organizers and a reputation, why not email them ahead of time, ask for the itinerary, and ask for the attendees? You can also ask about providing your info for followup story pitches. I don't know your field, but I suspect that many people will be happy to provide lots of info/pitches to you in lieu of you making the trip-perhaps more than you'll want! Good luck to you!

litzo27

So I was going to suggest bringing the LO and your mom or MIL (people definitely do that at conferences in my industry) but reading your response it seems that it's out of the question. In that case I think you have to either skip it or go for 1 or 2 days only if this is a case of "a little is better than nothing". Even then it sounds like your day would be crazy and if you are BFing and can't pump every 3 hours or so you're running a risk of both screwing your supply and having some serious clogged ducts/mastitis issues. And as PP mentioned if you deliver late you may only be 3 weeks post-partum.
So in your shoes I would skip it and spend the next several months getting inventive on what you can do to ease your post-leave workload given this challenge. I'm sure your career long-terms will be fine and you may even be able to spin this as a good thing in the future: "even without being able to make trip XYZ i was able to do the following..."

jasi704

@femshep Brilliant! I haven't even thought about contacting the event organizers and maybe getting information and photos from them. I would hope they would understand my situation and throw me a bone. I'll still entertain the idea of going on the trip...just in the rare case I actually deliver early. But if all I have is a month (or less) before LO arrives, then yea, I'll have to get resourceful!

csbucher

I took my LO on multiple work trips during the first year, but at four weeks (or less if you are late) it does not seem possible to me.

You will run into over supply issues if you start trying to save milk before your supply is regulated so you would have to feed your LO formula which could mess up breast feeding this early. Will you have the ability to pump religiously every three hours? If not, you will likely have supply issue or get clogged ducts.

Physically I was also not ready to be on my feet a ton at four weeks and was still wearing a huge pad. I would have also been an emotional wreck over leaving my LO at that point (more than I would have anticipated).

CarrieB.

I had a pretty easy labor, but at 4 weeks PP, I would start bleeding heavily if I just did a lot of cleaning. There is no way I could have been at a conference all day or traveled.

My baby was also week late and very colicky with reflux, so I was just barely functioning at 3-4 weeks PP. I think that it would be a really bad idea to try to plan to do anything complicated until at least 6-8 weeks after your baby is born.

laurakaz13

I think the others have given some good advice.  The bottom line is that you and only you can make this decision and most likely you'll have to make it after LO is born. 

I would have easily been able to travel a month or so after delivering.  In fact, I did travel cross country when she was 5 weeks old.  I took her with me.  I was also able to pump without screwing up nursing in anyway and my DD took a bottle immediately.  But this is just my story!  

I would try to bring your LO and a caregiver with you if you plan to do it.  Can your DH take that week off and go with you?  I'm very serious about my career and would not want to miss the opportunity.  You'll just have to see how it goes, but don't rule it out yet. 

laurakaz13

jf198400 said:

There is no way you can leave LO for so long at such a young age if you are BFing.period. The only way I can see even considering the trip is if LO comes too, with your DH to watch her. What will you be doing on the trip? If you are sitting and listening to a presentation and can nurse during it, then it might work. Fwiw I was almost 2 weeks late with both of my children.

Not true for everyone at all.  Travel a ton for work and BFing was not affected one bit from separation. 

jf198400

laurakaz13 said:

jf198400 said:

There is no way you can leave LO for so long at such a young age if you are BFing.period. The only way I can see even considering the trip is if LO comes too, with your DH to watch her. What will you be doing on the trip? If you are sitting and listening to a presentation and can nurse during it, then it might work.
Fwiw I was almost 2 weeks late with both of my children.

Not true for everyone at all.  Travel a ton for work and BFing was not affected one bit from separation. 


I'm not saying travel and BFing can't work. I'm saying that leaving LO for an entire week at 3weeks pp and BFing will not work. There is no way she would have time to pump a freezer stash in time, so her LO would have to have bottles of formula for an entire week. From her description it is unlikely she could pump frequently enough on the trip to maintain her supply. So she is setting herself up to fail. BFing as a FTM is challenging even without the stress of such a trip. I'm just trying to be realistic.

MamaBovs

I don't think you're crazy.  I would probably go on the trip. 

Iblamethebeer

jasi704 said:

Thanks for all your advice! Bringing LO is probably out of the question. It's kind of a unique trip. We travel from San Francisco and end up in Los Angeles by the end of the week. And we stay in a different city each night. It's a very, very busy week for me. So yea, even finding the time to nurse will be difficult. I would be on my feet a ton and be socializing from like 9am to 4pm everyday. And in between cities, I'll be in a car with four other people! Ugh...the more I think about it, the more it seems impossible

I was going to encourage you to go, but that just seems unworkable, unless you, mom/MIL and baby could take your own car and you only do half of the social events.

At 3 weeks PP with my first baby (and I would plan on being 3 weeks PP -- most first babies arrive late), nursing was a 45-60 minute ordeal that involved like 4 pillows, a nipple shield, and good lighting.  Then we repeated the process again 2 hours later.  There was none of this popping out to the car for 15 minutes with a blanket thrown over my shoulder business.

With that said, seriously, if you CAN get a map of the route and a schedule of the events and get to 60% of them, and that means your next year only 40% sucks, instead of 100% sucks, isn't that worth it?

groovygrl

I would try to do a tentative plan of going w/ a caregiver with the knowledge (like others ahve said) that physically you may not be able to do it...you're due march 1 but you could go early or you could go late or you could end up w/ a c/s which would change things, etcccc... it's hard to know. I'm not sure how far you are from San Fran as far as the actual travel to get there but is there any chance of going to just part of it? like a few days instead of the whole week or just do 1/2 days or something? Would your boss be supportive of that vs not going at all?
GL, that is a tough one

FemShep

One other thing to keep in mind if you do decide to go is that if your maternity leave is paid through a short-term disability policy, doing any kind of work invalidates the policy and could cost you your coverage. Insurance companies reason that if you're well enough to travel/work from home/work part time, you're well enough to be back at work and not claiming STD. It would be a shame to lose out on the rest of your paid leave if this applies to you. Good luck!

daisy662

I travel pretty extensively for my job and am something of a workaholic. I would not have been ready to leave DS at only a month old however he came 6 weeks early and was in the NICU for 3 weeks. I went back to work after 13 weeks and started to travel a few weeks after that. I remember not feeling "normal" until about 6 weeks after he was born.

Maybride2

At 4 weeks postpartum your baby very very likely won't be sleeping for more than 2-3 hours at a time, which means that YOU won't be sleeping for more than 2-3 hours at a time - especially if you are bfing. Yup, there's always the superwoman who was tap dancing and competing in triathlons a week after giving birth; but the majority of us are still bleeding, sweating profusely, sleep deprived hormonal zombies those first 6 weeks after delivery. Going to the grocery store was a tiring ordeal that first month with a newborn. My day was usually pretty successful if I managed to shower and get dressed in something other than sweat pants. There's a growth spurt around 4 weeks, so if you're bfing you'll be nursing most of the day - I just sat on the couch holding my babies, because they'd nurse for 20 minutes, fall asleep for a hour, then wake crying to eat again....rinse and repeat. But even if logistically you thought you could handle it, FemShep is right - you'll forfeit your STD pay and could run into trouble even with FMLA time. You can't pick and choose when you're up to working and when you're not with those, so only proceed if you're good with going back to work at 5 weeks.

jasi704

Thanks for all the advice! It helps a lot. I did consider the STD situation, and if I DID go on the business trip, I know I'd have to use vacation time once I return if I wanted to spend another couple weeks at home with the baby. That's another huge disadvantage to me going. At this point, it definitely seems the cons of this trip are outweighing the pros!