Just make sure your manager doesn’t find out

I was so exhausted I don’t think I would have remotely enjoyed it. I hated maternity leave. I thought it would be blissful and it wasn’t; it was tedious and tiring. Living your life in three hour increments for the feed/diaper/wake cycle. No sleep. Etc.

Anonymous wrote:Yes, it’s a great time to fly with your baby. The noise of the place will be like soothing white noise, they will sleep on the plane, they won’t be mobile yet (makes travel way more difficult). YMMV on a driving trip, though. Some babies are great in the car and some really hate car trips.

They are great until you descend and they can’t pop their ears and scream at the top of their lungs.

My babies were not easy. Neither were good sleepers (even after sleep training), both cried in the car seat, I had thrush at some point. With baby #2 I had PPD. It’s all a blur.

I think if you have an easy sleepy baby then go for it! But wait to plan something until you find out how you and your baby will be at the time. Ie don’t buy refundable options.

Also note that if a baby under 2 months gets a fever you may have to go to the ER. So don’t fly during cold/flu season if they’re that young.

Yes I sound like a debby downer, but all of that happened to me and it was pretty miserable.

Planning to take our newborn to Europe once our oldest is on summer break. Who cares where you take your maternity leave. This is your time! Companies have no loyalty to employees anymore. Do what you want with the little time you have on this planet, life is short. Go make family memories!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be sure to send vacation photos to coworkers assuming your workload for no extra pay.

Why are you shaming people for taking the leave they are entitled to? Managing work flow and capacity on a team is the organization's responsibility. What an insane take.

Entitled. Says it all. OP is asking about going on vacation.

Do you know what an entitlement is?

Obviously not. PP is jealous.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be sure to send vacation photos to coworkers assuming your workload for no extra pay.

Why are you shaming people for taking the leave they are entitled to? Managing work flow and capacity on a team is the organization's responsibility. What an insane take.

Entitled. Says it all. OP is asking about going on vacation.

Do you know what an entitlement is?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did any of you take a vacation during your maternity leave? I'm thinking in taking vacation in July or August. Any Recommendations on where to go?

Maternity leave is not vacation leave. Just another way you screw your employer and colleagues who have to do your job with no extra pay.

So during maternity leave, women are supposed to sit at home 24/7 and do nothing but breastfeed and do housework Got it.

/s

Misogynist much?

Np but it may be difficult to do anything beyond this based on experience.

That's essentially what I did- plus lots of pumping for triple feeding for weeks.

But I returned to work at 13 weeks.

I did take a vacation when 2nd baby was around 4.5 months old and that was great but was a road trip to the jersey shore. So much stuff to bring and would never take a baby that young on a plane due to infection risk

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Be sure to send vacation photos to coworkers assuming your workload for no extra pay.

Why are you shaming people for taking the leave they are entitled to? Managing work flow and capacity on a team is the organization's responsibility. What an insane take.

Entitled. Says it all. OP is asking about going on vacation.

We went to Europe and carried our first baby around in a front-facing baby carrier for a month before I had to go back to work. It's one of my better memories.

I wouldn't recommend it before your baby has had their vaccines. Planes and airports are very germy.

Flying with a kind who's 6 months plus isn't so bad, I'd just nurse my kid and he'd go to sleep but below that is tough. I definitely wouldn't do it before your kid is on a good sleep schedule.

My one piece of advice would be to buy refundable tickets and make sure that anyone involved in the trip (you, your husband, anyone you're visiting) is very aware of and on board with the idea that this is all tentative.

You can have some idea of how you might feel about a trip (though you also may surprise yourself) but you have NO idea what kind of baby you'll end up with. Some people go on these kinds of trips and love them, even internationally with pretty young babies. Some people (me!) even three babies in, think a trip like this would be hell on earth. Make sure you're building in flexibility and managing expectations.

Anonymous wrote:Be sure to send vacation photos to coworkers assuming your workload for no extra pay.

Hi! My maternity leave was unpaid. So I wasn't paid and coworkers also had to assume more workload for more pay. Maternity leave was a boon to my employer.

I loved all my maternity leave trips!! We took short flights. It was like pushing a celebrity around. I loved showing off the baby, walking around, and having a nice time with DH. We did Boston, Charleston and Maine.

At home, no one visited me (apparently because new moms are always so upset with visitors and complain so much online) and I was really lonely. My inlaws wouldn't visit either and just wanted us to come to them, but it wasn't relaxing like a hotel was. Baby cried a lot and there was nothing to do during the day. They were annoyed by breastfeeding too.