Anonymous wrote:I a federal employee as well. Can you telework for a bit? That made everything much easier for me. Also, requesting leave donations is a good idea. Just make sure that your doctor has also requested that you remain on bed rest, etc. God luck!

Does OP have a child care plan for teleworking?

FYI - don't do LWOP, use FMLA. LWOP status can have an effect on your comp start date, leave earnings, etc. If you can use FMLA unpaid, definitely invoke that vs just LWOP. This is what my HR advised me when I asked (though, to be fair, I think our HR has had to deal with maybe three pregnant female civilians since I've been here.....5 years long)

I am also a fed and plan on spreading my LWOP so I don't just stop getting a paycheck. You can do 40 hours leave/40 hours LWOP in a pay period or however works best for you.

Is there anyway you and your husband can split the week up during the weeks before the daycare spot opens up? Like you work 3 days/week and he works 2 days/week and you take turns?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I too am a fed and was planning on only taking 8 weeks. Now the financial situation is even worse as I will have to work in 11 furlough days so that will considerably shorten how long I can go on LWOP.

You can't shorten your leave by 11 days and take it all as one chunk at the end?

Not PP by another civilian...no, we can't take all 11 days as a chunk. Has to be spaced out, many people can't choose their day.

8 weeks isn't 'generous'. It's pathetic - frankly, so is 12 weeks unpaid. We tolerate completely subpar family leave programs in this country which only hurts our families (notice I didn't say parental leave). Having saved leave for 6 years in the hopes I would need it postpartum, I can't imagine how hard it is to save for #2.

Op, the suggestions to reduce saving for a little bit is a good one. Not ideal obviously, but better than nothing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you ask for people to donate their leave to do?

I would donate leave for someone with a serious medical condition, e.g. cancer, organ transplant, terrible accident, to take care of seriously ill family member. OP is not in any of those. She should have planned better as most of us do. Eight weeks is generous, more than generouz.

Whoa you're judged! You never know what is going on in other's lives to prevent them from saving up their leave. Some people have kids that have medical problems for which they have had to take time off. The mom could have medical issues. There could be any number of reasons why someone has not been able to save their leave. Karma is a bitch.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you ask for people to donate their leave to do?

I could, but I don't feel comfortable doing that. This is my personal opinion, but I am superstititous about it when other people have to request it for serious illnesses.

Does your place have a leave bank? We do where I work. That's what I used.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you ask for people to donate their leave to do?

I would donate leave for someone with a serious medical condition, e.g. cancer, organ transplant, terrible accident, to take care of seriously ill family member. OP is not in any of those. She should have planned better as most of us do. Eight weeks is generous, more than generouz.

Oh yea, 8 weeks of unpaid leave for the birth of a child.

God bless America.

Just wanted to chime in that I only took 7 weeks leave with each of my kids and it actually all came together fine. My kids starting sleeping 8 hour stretches, so I wasn't as tired. I had a good stash of breast milk and the second child was so much easier since I knew what to expect.

Know you have a child care gap to figure out but I'm sure you'll find a way to manage the work. Just make sure to have low expectations for housework, cooking, etc. initially so you can just focus on work, baby and rest!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can you ask for people to donate their leave to do?

I would donate leave for someone with a serious medical condition, e.g. cancer, organ transplant, terrible accident, to take care of seriously ill family member. OP is not in any of those. She should have planned better as most of us do. Eight weeks is generous, more than generouz.

Please read up-thread where I said I do not plan to ask for leave donation. Thanks for being such a generous person and assuming that I didn't "plan better."

Anonymous wrote:I too am a fed and was planning on only taking 8 weeks. Now the financial situation is even worse as I will have to work in 11 furlough days so that will considerably shorten how long I can go on LWOP.

You can't shorten your leave by 11 days and take it all as one chunk at the end?

Anonymous wrote:Can you ask for people to donate their leave to do?

I would donate leave for someone with a serious medical condition, e.g. cancer, organ transplant, terrible accident, to take care of seriously ill family member. OP is not in any of those. She should have planned better as most of us do. Eight weeks is generous, more than generouz.

Agree with lowering TSP contributions. Can you spread out your LWOP? So, take sick leave/annual leave for half the week and then LWOP for the other half? That way, you would get paid a little and you may not feel it as much.

I too am a fed and was planning on only taking 8 weeks. Now the financial situation is even worse as I will have to work in 11 furlough days so that will considerably shorten how long I can go on LWOP.

No offence OP as I really do understand your plight but a lot of us go through this. I am not a fed. I don't have paid maternity leave. I have FMLA. With DC1, I took 12 weeks and saved all 9 months of my pregnancy to do so. I will have to do the same for the one I am expecting now. It sucks but its what needs to be done. I suspect you'll have to do the same or just take less time.

Re: covering the one day gap when your husband is home. I had to go back to work 4 days a week when my baby was 8 weeks, my mother in law watched our baby 3 days and I worked one day a week from home, but I still needed a sitter for that one day. I hired a law student and a college student -- they could each babysit 4 hours a day -- while I worked. They didn't want/need a full time nanny position and they were able to get a lot of studying done while they baby slept.