Selfishly started. I’m so close to asking for a temporary disability placard. My body hurts way too much and these last few days have been hard to walk, stand, or sit. OR Asking my boss to start working from home so I can lay down more but I hate the thought of being home all the time. Better yet, can i just stop working? Lol
@wildtot Hahaha I know exactly how you feel. I had been generally ok, but this morning I realized how sore I was. It's starting to get to the point that it's a bit uncomfortable when baby starts changing positions. I don't start working from home officially until the week of 7/16...seems like a long time to wait. At least my boss is on vacation week of July 4th so I'll work from home then too.
Ugh I am right there with you on wanting to work from home! Starting next week I will have 2 work from home days per week, due to my twice weekly NSTs for the rest of pregnancy and it being pointless to do all that driving as it would just decrease the amount of time I could actually work. But for some reason my boss is avoiding the maternity leave conversation entirely, and it's starting to freak me out. Last pregnancy I worked from home full time when I turned 36 weeks per doctor's orders, and I don't know why she would think it would be any different this time, especially since she knows my hospital is even further away this time, AND I'm high risk this time. I also plan to take much more time off this time but since she is avoiding talking about it, she doesn't know that yet. I've tried bringing it up and she makes an excuse why she can't talk. I guess she just wants to avoid reality.
On a related note, I guess my confession is, I plan to take full advantage of both the disability law/pregnancy discrimination law AND the state's family leave law, and combine them to take 14 weeks off, and I really don't care how it's going to affect my boss. She will for sure fight me on it and tell me we are a small company and she can't have me out that long, and I honestly don't care. She's had 5 months to plan, and still has another 6-8 more weeks to plan, for me to be out and she chooses to sit back and ignore it. We had two really good candidates for law student interns and she chose to only hire one even though she usually hires two and she knew I'd be out this summer. That was her stupid decision. She chose not to try to find a temp for while I'm on leave, and she chooses to be out of the office 2-3 days per week even when things are crazy here. The city I work in requires employers to give employees 6-8 weeks to recover from child birth, and my state provides 8 weeks of paid job protected leave for bonding. Those are two different things, and I plan to take both, and I don't really care how it's going to affect her. Maybe if she hadn't treated me so horribly the first time and forced me to come back to work 6 weeks postpartum (actually, she called me when I was 4 weeks postpartum and asked me to come back the following week, and I refused, so I got one more week), I'd be more willing to come back sooner this time.
@zande2016 You should be taking as much time as possible! You gave sufficient notice and you're following state law. That sucks about your boss avoiding the maternity leave conversation, can they do that? That would stress me out but I'm nuts and had all my stuff signed off on way early.
@zande2016 I'm taking 14 weeks. I don't care how it affects the company in all honesty, I'm having a kid! I told my bosses at 10 weeks...so they've had all the time to figure things out, plus they even admitted they knew I was probably going to have kids at some point so they weren't mad or taken aback. I personally don't care or compromise about important life events that are going to affect me and my family for the rest of my life so go take full advantage, I'll be doing the same!
@kissableviv yup! Some things are non negotiable. Having a baby is the biggest life change event and deserves the time off. While I do not expect my employer to support me financially while I'm on leave, I am taking 1 month off before my due date and 6 months after. No guilt, no shame. I give my job my all (ok maybe a little less now that I'm pregnant) normally, I've been super dedicated here for over 10 years so hell yes I am taking my time now!
+1 for wanting a disability tag or just stop working. I feel a little guilty because I've basically been working from bed for weeks - don't get me wrong, it's BETTER, but little dude is kicking my arse. Days I went into the office I could barely walk by 9 am and my employees would watch me like a hawk every time I stood up and clutched the desk because my hip gave out. I'll be taking 10 weeks maternity off this time, mostly unpaid, and not going to lie wish it could just start NOW.
confession: DD has been watching WAY too much tv, but it's about all I can handle right now. We talk during the movie/show so it's not just brainless boob tube. She'll ask "where did mickey/princess/etc go?" or "what's that?" or "what happened?" and I'll explain (try explaining swan princess being a girl and a bird to a 2 year old...). I just can't handle getting on the floor to play, or chasing her outside, or walking around the block right now, and since I'm not doing much in terms of house work, DH has to do that and there's only so many hours in the day. I know i'm doing the best I can and this is temporary but I still feel guilty.
Im also on the I want to stop working train. I have plans to work up until I’m in labor, but this week my body is so tired and sore- at 32 weeks, is this what’s it’s like for the rest of the time? Lol anyway I have a few long weekends from now to then so I’m hoping that will help!
my FFFC is I’m now eating “like I’m pregnant”- I went 30 weeks being super healthy, and these past two weeks I am 100% giving in to cravings etc. I know I will regret it, but I just need chicken fingers and fries sometimes! Lol
@gingerbride26 i have those days too when DS has his shows on all day. The discomfort is just way too much some days. +1 on no guilt for taking time off. I will be off one week before c section and 12 wks complete leave. From October to end of December I’ll be part time to use up the rest of my leave. I. Reality it’s a total of 19 wks spread out over 5 months. And it’s only been 5 months in my new position.
My FFFC is not exactly earth shattering today, I cancelled all my video meetings today because "something else has come up". That something else? The fact that I'm working, but I refuse to put on pants or a bra. I'm too uncomfortable, too hot, too nauseous, and gravity seems to be really making me feel very pregnant and very huge and I'm just going to wear an old worn out t-shirt and underpants and if anybody tries to make me get dressed, I think I'll have an epic toddler level meltdown today. And I'm not sorry about any of it.
@foxbaby2016 it depends on your state. Federal (FMLA) is 12 weeks and some states provide "bonding" time or other additional leave that is on top of FMLA which may or may not be paid. I believe in CT HR said I also get an additional 6 weeks CT protected leave on top of the 12 weeks FMLA, but that was more unpaid leave than i was willing to take.
@foxbaby2016 California has 6 weeks of disability for a normal vaginal delivery and 8 weeks for a c section. After that, it transitions to 6 weeks pfl -paid family leave. I'm not sure if that can be extended. Also you can take 4 weeks disability before baby. I would looooove to do it but I feel like it's a waste for me because 1)I'm feeling well 2) I work from home and this is my first so I don't have a toddler to chase 3) I don't want to be gone for work that long.
My plan is to do 6+6 and add on 2 with my state farm policy that I pay for separately. So a total of 14. Unfortunately the 4 weeks before baby that California provides cannot be moved to after, it's use it or lose it...I *might* chance it and use it literally for 4-5 days.
@kissableviv I was under the impression that for CA it's the 6 or 8 weeks paid disability after birth then 12 weeks of FMLA which is partially paid so if you take the full amount of those it's an 18-20 week leave after baby, plus, the month before delivery.
Also, omg the 4 weeks off before your due date are glorious, I admire you for not taking it but also think you're partially nuts lol.
New York has started a new Paid Family Leave where you get 50% of your paycheck (capped at a certain amount) up to 8 weeks for 2018 and will go up to 12 weeks at 67% of pay by 2021. Federal FMLA will cover up to 12 weeks unpaid if your place of work has over 50 employees.
My company does a thing where I will get paid out using Short Term Disability and the new New York law and then will cover the remaining amount up to make me whole. I am fortunate enough to work somewhere with a great Maternity leave policy (16 weeks paid - yay for big tech companies), but I know others are not as lucky. However, I am happy to hear of the new law in New York to help others who don't have employers with as generous of benefits.
Vermont's governor is getting ready to veto a bill that would give 6 weeks of paid family leave via a payroll tax on Vermonters, because he doesn't think Vermonters "can afford it." His excuse for everything. Do any of you know how your states finance this? Just wondering if Vermont's approach is typical or there is another way.
For California i think you may qualify for added disability (long term) if your doctor orders it. I had to use up my short term prior to delivery and i think i could have continued after with doctor’s orders. Double check in that.
@runsomewhere I have to work to be honest, but thankfully it's not a burden (yet!). My job is not very demanding and I don't want to be gone 4 weeks before and then maybe baby is 2 weeks late, in my view it is a waste. I am home all day and I'm able to get things done on my breaks and I just have to make it work because my full salary is more valuable to me right now and I don't have all these things to take care of - once my mom is here she'll hopefully be a huge help with last minute things!
When I read up about family leave yesterday it mentioned 6 weeks, the additional 6 may be those you can "integrate" if you go back part time? I still need to do some research. I'll also see if California pays more than my policy or vice versa and go from there.
@runsomewhere I was also given the same information you stated. I start working from home full time on June 11th and plan on going on leave 20 days before my due date. My work gives us 4 months unpaid leave, which I plan to take full advantage of. I will do the disability then FMLA. I also have additional STD through Cigna to use.
FFFC: My baby shower is tomorrow and I would rather not participate because I want to lay in bed all day instead and not deal with people. I am VERY thankful for everyone who is attending and throwing me the shower, however I am just not into it...
@smashjam I'm in New York, our paid family leave law just went into effect in January as another poster mentioned, and I believe last July employers began withholding from paychecks to pay into it. I have to check my pay stub but I am pretty sure my biweekly deduction is less than $2. Basically every private employer in NY is covered by the law, so all that money gets pooled and the fund is used to pay people who use it. In NY it is not only for bonding with a baby within a year of he/she being born, but can also be used to care for a sick family member. Also it can be used however you want - so you can take one day a week, half days, all at once, etc. We get 8 weeks this year, 50% up to a state cap, which I make well over so I'll be getting a good deal less than 50% of my salary but it is better than the nothing I had before. Eventually we will get 67% for 12 weeks, in a few years.
The way I get 14 is: I am NOT covered by FMLA. Employer is too small. However, New York has short term disability leave, and you get 6 weeks for vaginal birth. This is to recover from child birth. There is NO job protection, and the pay is laughable - the cap is $170/week. But, New York City has its very own pregnancy discrimination law, which applies to employers with 4 or more employees. Yay, I qualify for that! This law says your employer must make reasonable accommodations for pregnancy and child birth, and that includes giving time off to recover from child birth. So the way I am interpreting the law (and I called A Better Balance, the organization that helped lobby for NY's paid family leave, and spoke to their free legal hotline to confirm how I was reading the laws, and they do agree with my interpretation), there are two different entitlements - short term disability to recover from giving birth (which has no job protection and pays very little, but thanks to the NYC local law, I can't be fired for taking time off to recover from child birth), and 8 weeks of paid family leave for bonding. My plan is to take my 6 weeks, and use accrued PTO to get paid for 3 of them, and the other 3 will be the $170/week NY gives for short term disability. Then I plan to immediately go into paid family leave for 8 weeks. PFL is brand new and there's been zero litigation, so I don't know for sure how it would all play out if my employer decided to fire me. But it does seem pretty clear that I am entitled to both of these things.
That was a really long winded explanation. I spent a lot of time researching and thinking about this. Unfortunately it was necessary for me because my boss will only do the bare minimum for me that she is required to under the law.
@WorkinWeezel I'm sorry, this country really blows when it comes to this. With my first, I was new at my job and had ZERO vacation time because my employer only gives you vacation AFTER your first year of working. I got 6 weeks total, 2 of them were paid using the following year's vacation that I "borrowed", and the other 4 were totally unpaid (I could have gotten $170/week from the state for those 4 weeks, but stupidly didn't get the paperwork in on time so I missed out). That was in 2016, so for all of 2017 I couldn't take any time off aside from my 5 sick days because I had used all my vacation time that I "borrowed" to give birth. Nothing makes me more angry than the way this country handles pregnancy and child birth.
I was very disappointed in the maternity leave policy considering I work for a large university. We can take up to 7 months off however all of that is unpaid unless you plan to use your vacation or sick time. After the FMLA (12 weeks) you have to start paying back your health benefits for what the university would normally cover—my husband is under my insurance so it would be over $1k a month just for that and on top of not being paid. There is another policy that covers an additional 12 weeks however they aren’t sure if the university pays for their portion of your benefits and I was told they are looking into it; still haven’t heard back. They are pretty lenient in that you can take up to 7 months off but again unpaid.
I do get short term disability but that will only cover 60% of my salary for 6 weeks if I have a vaginal birth or 8 weeks if c section. I have to use 11 days of my own paid time off beforehand in order to get the disability which is why HR recommends you start leave 2 weeks before your due date. The short term disability isn’t additional time to the 12 weeks FMLA, it’s just what we would get paid for.
So although I would love to take all the time (7 months), it doesn’t make sense so I will most likely take about 15 weeks off and use the rest of the leave I get under policy to take off one or two days a week until I run out. Such a headache!
No paid leave in my state either. I have to use my vacation and sick time for it, so I've been desperate to take a couple days off but hoarding my PTO to use while I'm out, plus the short term disability I have which is 6 weeks and 60% of my salary, between the two I'll have some sort of paycheck for a chunk of my leave but it still stresses me out. Technically I'm not protected by FMLA either because while I work for a larger company, I'm the only employee in my state and to officially qualify you're supposed to be within 75 miles of an office. My company assures me I have a job to come back to, so I'll have to bank on that, also the value I know I have in the open market, still, makes me nervous.
@zande2016 thanks fornthat explanation! Sounds like what Vermonters would be looking at really, and while I know it's "another tax" it's a good one not just for pregnant people!
I am at the vet, have been for hours. Our dog started shaking uncontrollably and it turns out she was having a diabetic crisis...weve never even discussed diabetes as a possibility with Her! We are, of course, right on cash and were looking at an actual surplus this month! Now it's more cc debt and an even tighter budget to get this done, plus god only knows how much more monthly for the rest of her life. I know someone was just talking about having to put their dog down because they were diabetic and I can't remember if it was on here but man...shes 5. And checking her blood glucose twice a day and shooting her up I don't know how I'll do that and work when I finally go back, as it was looking like I'd have to because of finances. I don't know what we're gonna do.
@smashjam the deduction is so tiny, I’m sure most people didn’t even notice it. Oh no, I’m so sorry about your dog! I’m glad they caught it and figured out what was wrong, but I know having a diabetic dog is not easy at all. or cheap.
@SmashJam I'm really sorry to hear about your dog However, coming from a vet tech and T1 diabetic, please don't euthanize your dog for this. Shots are actually easy to give and there are places to purchase insulin at a fairly low cost. If it's too much for your family to manage (which is completely understandable), look into surrendering your dog. Diabetes for a dog is not a death sentence and can be fairly easily managed after the initial couple months of learning their curve. I'm sure you're already talking to your vet about concerns but be sure that conversation continues bc they are there to help!
@SmashJam sorry to hear about your dog! We have family and friends with diabetics pets and it seems manageable (not sure about the expense). Hope things turn out ok on whatever you decide.
@SmashJam I'm so sorry to hear about your dog. I mentioned a few months ago that we put my parents dog down due to diabetic issues. However, he was 11 and was in severe distress. They were going to have to hospitalize him for at least 2 days at an emergency vet to get him stable and even that was questionable. Then if they were able to stabilize him, he would need injections 2 times a days with a special diet for the remainder of his life. The vet was very realistic with us in this scenario. She thought it was best to ease his pain because of the severity of the issue. If your girl is only 5 and this is treatable, please help her. Look into pet insurance for her because this will help off set cost as well. I hope everything works out!!!
@SmashJam sorry to hear about your pup! 5 is definitely young so I hope they are able to come up with a good and affordable treatment plan. Definitely agree with @zombiehoohaa about looking into insurance. We have healthy paws for our guy.
Okay, there weren’t enough real confessions in here, so I’ll get this thread back on track. Every night, my husband rubs my feet with lotion for like 15 mins per foot, because he’s awesome. Then when he’s done, my dog likes to come lick all the lotion off my feet. Not only do I let him, but I like it. It feels good.
I don’t like being licked by dogs for whatever reason but cat licks are funny. I had a cat who would lick my dads salty arms after being outside all day.
@zande2016 your DH rubs your feet every night before you go to bed?!?! I love foot massages and DH used to do them all the time but then he was like, "carpel tunnel, can't" and does them for like, maybe 2 minutes every few months, and I have to beg for both feet.
I do let my weird lil corgi lick my feet for no reason, however. Sometimes it feels odd so I make her stop but she'll do it for several minutes at a time just as a compulsion.
@SmashJam he used to do it a couple times a week, and as I’ve become more pregnant he started agreeing more, until finally we got to the point where he accepted that it was gonna be an every night thing. Once this baby comes we’ll prob go back to just a couple times a week. Pregnancy is hard, I milk it for all I can.
Real Confession: in my neurotic brain I'm super jealous that my bro and SIL got to have an actual small-sized baby while I've given birth to two large babies and will probably again this time. My niece will be 2.5 months when this one is born. At her 1 month check she was still only 7 lbs 12 oz. I feel like I'm getting ripped off in the real baby experience department bc everyone just focuses on how huge my babies are, and now that our babies will likely be compared to one another for the rest of life, and this one will most likely be bigger that theirs when it's born and theirs is 2.5 months old. l'm jealous that I likely will not get the chance of having a small baby. Ridiculous, I know, but still.
Re: FFFC 5/18
I’m so close to asking for a temporary disability placard. My body hurts way too much and these last few days have been hard to walk, stand, or sit.
OR
Asking my boss to start working from home so I can lay down more but I hate the thought of being home all the time.
Better yet, can i just stop working? Lol
On a related note, I guess my confession is, I plan to take full advantage of both the disability law/pregnancy discrimination law AND the state's family leave law, and combine them to take 14 weeks off, and I really don't care how it's going to affect my boss. She will for sure fight me on it and tell me we are a small company and she can't have me out that long, and I honestly don't care. She's had 5 months to plan, and still has another 6-8 more weeks to plan, for me to be out and she chooses to sit back and ignore it. We had two really good candidates for law student interns and she chose to only hire one even though she usually hires two and she knew I'd be out this summer. That was her stupid decision. She chose not to try to find a temp for while I'm on leave, and she chooses to be out of the office 2-3 days per week even when things are crazy here. The city I work in requires employers to give employees 6-8 weeks to recover from child birth, and my state provides 8 weeks of paid job protected leave for bonding. Those are two different things, and I plan to take both, and I don't really care how it's going to affect her. Maybe if she hadn't treated me so horribly the first time and forced me to come back to work 6 weeks postpartum (actually, she called me when I was 4 weeks postpartum and asked me to come back the following week, and I refused, so I got one more week), I'd be more willing to come back sooner this time.
confession: DD has been watching WAY too much tv, but it's about all I can handle right now. We talk during the movie/show so it's not just brainless boob tube. She'll ask "where did mickey/princess/etc go?" or "what's that?" or "what happened?" and I'll explain (try explaining swan princess being a girl and a bird to a 2 year old...). I just can't handle getting on the floor to play, or chasing her outside, or walking around the block right now, and since I'm not doing much in terms of house work, DH has to do that and there's only so many hours in the day. I know i'm doing the best I can and this is temporary but I still feel guilty.
my FFFC is I’m now eating “like I’m pregnant”- I went 30 weeks being super healthy, and these past two weeks I am 100% giving in to cravings etc. I know I will regret it, but I just need chicken fingers and fries sometimes! Lol
+1 on no guilt for taking time off. I will be off one week before c section and 12 wks complete leave. From October to end of December I’ll be part time to use up the rest of my leave. I. Reality it’s a total of 19 wks spread out over 5 months. And it’s only been 5 months in my new position.
Tell me more about the 14 weeks of leave....how does this work? I am only entitled (to my knowledge)to 12 weeks FMLA
My plan is to do 6+6 and add on 2 with my state farm policy that I pay for separately. So a total of 14. Unfortunately the 4 weeks before baby that California provides cannot be moved to after, it's use it or lose it...I *might* chance it and use it literally for 4-5 days.
Also, omg the 4 weeks off before your due date are glorious, I admire you for not taking it but also think you're partially nuts lol.
My company does a thing where I will get paid out using Short Term Disability and the new New York law and then will cover the remaining amount up to make me whole. I am fortunate enough to work somewhere with a great Maternity leave policy (16 weeks paid - yay for big tech companies), but I know others are not as lucky. However, I am happy to hear of the new law in New York to help others who don't have employers with as generous of benefits.
When I read up about family leave yesterday it mentioned 6 weeks, the additional 6 may be those you can "integrate" if you go back part time? I still need to do some research. I'll also see if California pays more than my policy or vice versa and go from there.
The way I get 14 is: I am NOT covered by FMLA. Employer is too small. However, New York has short term disability leave, and you get 6 weeks for vaginal birth. This is to recover from child birth. There is NO job protection, and the pay is laughable - the cap is $170/week. But, New York City has its very own pregnancy discrimination law, which applies to employers with 4 or more employees. Yay, I qualify for that! This law says your employer must make reasonable accommodations for pregnancy and child birth, and that includes giving time off to recover from child birth. So the way I am interpreting the law (and I called A Better Balance, the organization that helped lobby for NY's paid family leave, and spoke to their free legal hotline to confirm how I was reading the laws, and they do agree with my interpretation), there are two different entitlements - short term disability to recover from giving birth (which has no job protection and pays very little, but thanks to the NYC local law, I can't be fired for taking time off to recover from child birth), and 8 weeks of paid family leave for bonding. My plan is to take my 6 weeks, and use accrued PTO to get paid for 3 of them, and the other 3 will be the $170/week NY gives for short term disability. Then I plan to immediately go into paid family leave for 8 weeks. PFL is brand new and there's been zero litigation, so I don't know for sure how it would all play out if my employer decided to fire me. But it does seem pretty clear that I am entitled to both of these things.
That was a really long winded explanation. I spent a lot of time researching and thinking about this. Unfortunately it was necessary for me because my boss will only do the bare minimum for me that she is required to under the law.
Married: 6/27/2008
DS: 3/14/2010 Planned, PG first try
M/C 6/2012
DD: 4/22/2013 Planned, UnDx Infertility, PG on our own
BFP: 10/28/2016 Unplanned, HUGE SURPRISE!
M/C 12/12/2016
BFP: 10/27/2017 Unplanned, HUGE SURPRISE
EDD: 7/2/2018
I do get short term disability but that will only cover 60% of my salary for 6 weeks if I have a vaginal birth or 8 weeks if c section. I have to use 11 days of my own paid time off beforehand in order to get the disability which is why HR recommends you start leave 2 weeks before your due date. The short term disability isn’t additional time to the 12 weeks FMLA, it’s just what we would get paid for.
So although I would love to take all the time (7 months), it doesn’t make sense so I will most likely take about 15 weeks off and use the rest of the leave I get under policy to take off one or two days a week until I run out. Such a headache!
I am at the vet, have been for hours. Our dog started shaking uncontrollably and it turns out she was having a diabetic crisis...weve never even discussed diabetes as a possibility with Her! We are, of course, right on cash and were looking at an actual surplus this month! Now it's more cc debt and an even tighter budget to get this done, plus god only knows how much more monthly for the rest of her life. I know someone was just talking about having to put their dog down because they were diabetic and I can't remember if it was on here but man...shes 5. And checking her blood glucose twice a day and shooting her up I don't know how I'll do that and work when I finally go back, as it was looking like I'd have to because of finances. I don't know what we're gonna do.
I do let my weird lil corgi lick my feet for no reason, however. Sometimes it feels odd so I make her stop but she'll do it for several minutes at a time just as a compulsion.
Married: 6/27/2008
DS: 3/14/2010 Planned, PG first try
M/C 6/2012
DD: 4/22/2013 Planned, UnDx Infertility, PG on our own
BFP: 10/28/2016 Unplanned, HUGE SURPRISE!
M/C 12/12/2016
BFP: 10/27/2017 Unplanned, HUGE SURPRISE
EDD: 7/2/2018