Splitting up kid sick days when one parent has more leave

[Anonymous]

What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m also a Fed and due to the lack of mat leave I’m in the red after my second child’s birth. Dh has to do all doctors appts and take off when they’re sick. It’s not easy. But what’s the alternative? I lose my job? I can’t use advanced annual leave unless if I were on FMLA and that’s not meant for when my kids have pink eye.

I’m sorry PP, that sounds really stressful! I am lucky that I can take advanced annual if needed.

[Anonymous]

I would factor in how much flak each of you would get for staying home. The benefit of switching off is that it makes the absences less frequent. I’ve had jobs where it was no big deal to take off because of a sick kid and jobs where it was.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

This. You have 2 sick days. He has, what, 10?

Once you blow yours on 1 doctor's visit for yourself and 1 well visit for the baby, then tell him he has to stay home for any illnesses. Or he can compromise and take some baby appointments so you can save a day for illness.

DH is shortsighted if he would rather take a maybe illness than a scheduled appointment.

[Anonymous]

Whoever it is easier for should stay home. Sometimes that means whoever has more leave. Sometimes is means whoever will get the least flak, or whoever can flex their schedule the easiest.

It's definitely not a tit for tat thing. You have to take the whole picture in to consideration.

Sometimes I've had more leave, but I had a really important meeting I couldn't miss. Sometimes I had less leave, but DH was traveling, so we had no other choice. You get the picture.

[Anonymous]

I sympathize. I'm also a fed and went into the red after my 2nd was born. Some managers I know are super flexible and work with you, but mine is rigid, even when HR told her she had some discretion about granting leaves. So she would not allow advanced sick leave for occasional illnesses.

Bottom line, you're near empty. I think the logical working default should be that whenever a child gets sick, your H stay home with them, UNLESS he has work engagement that's hard to get out of. You only dip into your reserve when there's no other solution around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

NP here. If you don't think that gender roles play into who is the "default parent" in the relationship, you're not thinking critically about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

NP here. If you don't think that gender roles play into who is the "default parent" in the relationship, you're not thinking critically about this.

But this post has nothing top do with who the default parent is (despite your attempt to interject that issue). It has to do with balancing a whole host of factors, which include, but are not limited to, who has the most leave.

[Anonymous]

Our company has no maternity leave. I did partially paid for my 12 weeks maternity leave for both kids (3 year old & 3 month old), so I didn't have to use up many of my sick leave/vacation hours. I & DH have not been on vacation for the last few years, & first kid was with nanny (did not get sick easily) for the first 2 years. That helped to save some hours. I took a lot of sick leave during my latest pregnancy because of my health problems & first kid also gets sick from daycare as well.

So far, I have 6 weeks left, and DH has 10 weeks left. It is easy to use up, so I have been trying my best to save hours to prepare in advance when my 2nd kid goes to daycare.

Nanny is good to prevent germs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

The OP didn't indicate any other mitigating factors other than amount of leave and I wasn't ranting about the inequality between men and women, I was talking about the inequality between the poster and her husband. If you want to go and apply a whole imaginary host of factors that the OP mentioned, you are more than welcome but it isn't relevant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

The OP didn't indicate any other mitigating factors other than amount of leave and I wasn't ranting about the inequality between men and women, I was talking about the inequality between the poster and her husband. If you want to go and apply a whole imaginary host of factors that the OP mentioned, you are more than welcome but it isn't relevant.

You truly are too dense for words.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DH and I have two kids, 3 and 9 months, and we disagree about how to split up kid sick days. (We both work outside the home.) When we had one kid we typically split up sick days, trading off to stay home when our child was ill. But then I used up all of my sick/annual leave when our second child was born (I’m a fed), and I’m only just getting out of the red when it comes to sick leave. DH also took parental leave, but his company has dedicated parental leave and he didn’t have to use sick or annual leave. At the present moment, he had something like 20 vacation days and 15 sick days in the bank, while I have something like 2 of each. Given the imbalance in our leave totals, I think we should split up sick days a bit differently, but we’re having a hard time agreeing? Anyone btdt?

How ling did you take off for each kid, was it more than the month your DH took? If so, he is still in the hole and needs to make a few of those days up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What the hell is going on? He has leave, you don't . He uses it. What kind of a jerk wouldn't agree to that. You used all yours because you were pushing a human being out of your vagina. As soon as he is willing to do that then he can have things be more equal. He needs to grow up and do his part. If either of you are under the impression that this marriage and kids thing is gonna be equal then you are going to be more and more disappointed. You are a team and you each do what needs to be done to move forward. Sometimes you give 80 and only get 20, sometimes you only give 20 and get 80. Hopefully at the end of the journey you end up somewhere around 50/50 but maybe not. If you are keeping score you will never, ever be happy or satisfied. Also be really careful that your kids don't feel like they are a burden to you when they are sick. It isn't their fault!

That fact that you think it can be boiled down to amount of leave, without any other factors, and then pivot immediately to ranting about inequality between men and women shows you're just not thinking critically about this.

The OP didn't indicate any other mitigating factors other than amount of leave and I wasn't ranting about the inequality between men and women, I was talking about the inequality between the poster and her husband. If you want to go and apply a whole imaginary host of factors that the OP mentioned, you are more than welcome but it isn't relevant.

You truly are too dense for words.

I'm sure that you have a super important job and can't ever take off to do anything else and are resentful that anyone would expect you to pull your weight with your family.

[Anonymous]

Depends on what he does for work.

DH has never taken a sick day in his life. I have taken every sick day and snow day, basically all the surprise day offs. I also did all school events. DH did do many teacher work days and breaks.

I’m now a SAHM and DH earns a seven figure income.