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May 2016 Moms
ratliffn1
member
Unpaid maternity leave
ratliffn1
member
I am due in May with my first. Needless to say I'm scared of everything and I'm a worrier. I work for a small but family friendly business. Or so I thought. They basically laughed when I announced my pregnancy and asked them about our maternity policy. It is unpaid. How have others dealt with this situation and how have they saved? Did you cut your time short with your new baby because of money? I am looking into whether or not we have short term disability but I highly doubt it. Advice and tips would be greatly appreciated. I am educated and make a fair wage but we are tight and concerned.
Re: Unpaid maternity leave
I'm not sure what we would do if I had no paid time off, it would definitely be tight.
I think starting to look at your budget now and cutting things that you don't actually need is a place to start.
Good luck!!
Last time, we made two months of freezer meals to offset the cost of groceries while I wasn't working--and to save time with a newborn.
Been married since 2009.
Unicornuate Uterus (yes I menstruate glitter)
Several MCs
DD born 2013 (our miracle "you can't have babies" baby!)
BFP 1: 9/15/2013 | DD 5/23/2014
BFP 2: 9/15/2015 | EDD 5/26/2016
Our insurance SUCKS and we're looking at paying an estimated $6200, not including ultrasounds, labs, or any other testing the Dr wants me to do. Luckily we'll be able to switch our insurance to a slightly better plan in February, so hopefully it will save us a grand or two.
As for maternity leave, I'm a contract social worker for our courts so I'm technically self employed. So I don't get paid maternity leave or even any sick/vacation time. Luckily I have a great supervisor and coworkers who are willing to cover my clients so I'm hoping to take off 8 weeks and then come back part time for a month, or at least be able to flex my schedule so that I'm only face to face with clients 2.5-3 days of the week and my MIL will hopefully watch the baby while I'm at work. I've also considered asking my supervisor if I can do data entry from home for maybe 5 hours a week so there is a portion of my income coming in still. In the meantime, we're just budgeting and trying to save a lot so that we're covered for the two months or so that I'll be off work.
I'm technically still on maternity leave with my 26 month old. Unpaid of course. At my job (I work for the local city government) we get up to 4 years maternity leave. Up to the first year you get your exact positron back. After that and up to four years you still have a job with the same title and pay but you may be placed into a different department.
I used up all of my pto/sick/vacation days within the first four months of my maternity leave. My insurance coverage ended after 3 months with an option for cobra coverage but I just switched over to my husband's insurance.
I originally put in for a six month leave, then a year until the hr lady advised me to just take the four years and if I want to come back early just let them know.
What I didn't expect was how much I love being a stay at home mom. It's the hardest most exhausting job I've ever had but I love it.
Day care is insanely expensive where I live and we're not in the "nanny bracket". We don't have any family here so we don't have that as an option either. Basically I would've been paying someone my take home salary to watch my son so we decided it would be better if I stayed at home for four years until preschool starts.
Financially it's been challenging. We've definitely made a big dent in our savings the past 2 years and (as I'm the more frivolous spender of the two of us) I've definitely learned not only to live with less but to try to really stick to a budget. But what's helped me is knowing it's all for a good cause. I wouldn't trade these last couple of years staying home with my son for anything. I've had the best time and I'm grateful everyday that I'm able to do this.
After that I have short term disability that will kick in For about 60% pay. At that time I may have to pay back the part of monthly insurance that work usually pays but I'm switching to my husbands insurance in Jan to avoid that loss.
We are saving wherever possible, planning to buy most baby gear used or on clearance, and I worry about money a lot. We've set aside a portion of savins to cover delivery too. We are buying a house next spring/summer so between that, adding daycare in Aug, & baby expenses it is scary money-wise!
Honestly I was surprised too. It may have to do with the fact it's considered nationally accredited (it's actually the only one like that in the state I think). They also have a pretty good relationship with the local hospital the next city over. It was literally the only one we found that did cover anything. We have a bunch in the area closer to us and none of the others had affiliations with insurance companies so it would have been significantly more expensive. We actually ended up liking this one best of all the others anyway so we definitely lucked out.
I went to grad school for public policy, and I find health policy super interesting. One of my biggest frustrations is when they talk about "affordable healthcare" in the US, the conversation is around how to give everyone access. No one wants to talk about the root issue - why is it so expensive in the first place? The New York Times had a great piece on this several months ago and had an example where a person went in for surgery. There was one doctor that operated on the patient. The hospital, however, billed the insurance company saying that there were two doctors which bumped up the price. The person/patient noticed this on their insurance statement and actually called their insurance company and asked about it which leads to a large investigation about hospital billing fraud. People want to instantly villainize the insurance companies (and they are evil), but let's not forget the hospitals. Gone are the days of your small town doctor since they could no longer afford their own insurance and overhead and were sucked up by mega-hospitals. These are businesses and money making entities. It's one big mess.
You can play around and search different articles.
https://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/?action=click®ion=Masthead&pgtype=SectionFront&module=SearchSubmit&contentCollection=health&t=qry884#/hospital+insurance/
Married: Oct 20, 2013
BFP 1: Aug 31, 2015
EDD 1: May 12, 2016
DD1 Emma born May 12, 2016
An Honest Account of New Motherhood (with Postpartum Anxiety, Depression, and OCD)
BFP 2: October 07, 2019
EDD 2: June 20, 2020
Ladies, if you get the option, you might want to consider an HDHP (high deductible) plan w/ HSA. For a family, my premium is only $160 per month and once the deductible of $4,000 is met (can be met by one or a combination of multiple family members, unlike PPO), 100% of all additional fees are covered by insurance for the remainder of the year. I'll save well over $10,000 between premium and deductible when compared to my company's PPO plan offering.
My job offers 4 weeks of paid maternity leave. After that you have to use accumulated sick leave (up to a maximum of 8 weeks) or vacation time. I have way more accrued sick time than I'm allowed to use -- I could take four and a half months of straight sick time if that were permitted -- so I'll be using the full 8 weeks. That's 12 weeks of leave at full pay before I have to start tapping vacation time.
I honestly expect that after being at home for four weeks, I'll be clawing at the walls wanting to get out, but it's nice to know that I have the extra time if it's needed. I wish everybody had the luxury of some paid time off.
It really is a disgrace that the U.S. doesn't have better national policies on that front, although I guess it's good that at least one of the major parties is making that an issue for the upcoming presidential campaign.