In order to figure out how much money I should try to save up for having a kid, I need to figure out how much time I’ll be off work without pay. I took a glance through the employee manual and am more confused than before I looked at it. Apparently I can have 2 weeks paid parental leave, which plays into the FMLA 12-week allowance, part of which may need to be supplemented by using up all my paid vacation and sick time. Then there’s Minnesota law which says the employer must provide me with 6 weeks unpaid leave. Uh thanks, but I already got 12 weeks from the federal government? I don’t get it all, but it sounds like I would use up any vacation and sick time first and then what? No days off for the rest of the year? Seems odd, especially if I had a baby in January and then had to work without break for nearly 12 months. On the other hand, not so bad if it happens in November. I will have to talk to HR when I get this all figured out, see if there’s a way to keep at least a few vacation days for the sake of sanity.
Anyway, it doesn’t really answer how long I would have to go unpaid. There’s something about how FMLA can be intermittant, so I wonder if NT and I could switch off using FMLA. I guess it would depend on whether his employer allows it. They’re a smaller company, so who knows what rules they’re governed by? Maybe that’s where the Minnesota 6 weeks requirement comes in handy…
And of course I really hope there’s a way AS can take some time to spend with baby, but I don’t know how that’s going to pan out if she’s not one of the legal parents. Hopefully she will be getting a job where she can work from home occasionally.
Anyway, we sort of settled on a time to start trying to get pregnant, so that’s one question almost out of the way. We’re going to Vegas in March, so we thought I should stay on the pill till then, and start trying after. Our last immature-adult vacation for a while; what better place to have a blow-out than Vegas?
