The spreadsheet is color-coded by week, too.

[telerib]

You would think that, it being a not-uncommon occurrence, maternity leave would be fairly simple to arrange.

You would be wrong.

First, there is the Sick Leave Question. To wit: how much, if any, sick leave may one use? The commonly accepted wisdom in federal circles is, "Six weeks." But the regulations jump up and down to say that you may only use sick leave for "disability."

The third or fourth government website you hit finally lets you know that most doctors will consider the six weeks after delivery to qualify as "disabled." Oh, OK. I've asked for a medical note to document this.

So, first you burn up all your sick leave, then all your annual leave. Then you may finish out that six week period by using advanced sick leave. No, you can't have six weeks of sick leave advanced, unless you were totally out of leave to begin with. You just get enough to finish the six weeks.

Now, there's a leave donor program, where my co-workers can pitch me an hour or two to help dig me out of sick leave debt. I believe that I qualify (for the leftover bit of the six weeks) but the personnel admin does not. I must arm myself with Paperwork and go and see her.

After that, it's (relatively) simple: advanced annual leave (as much as I'd earn between now and the end of the year) and when that's gone, leave without pay until my 12 weeks of Family Medical Leave are gone.

The spreadsheet became necessary to track which kind of leave was being burned when, in the first or second six week period, and what was happening to the leave that I was earning even as I was spending other leave.

Whew.

I mean, I'm glad I have leave to spend, but damn, why does no one seem to be able to agree on if or how I can spend it?

Comments

[aylinn.livejournal.com]

That's an EASY answer -

You work for a government agency. 'Nuff Said.

[giddysinger.livejournal.com]

Basically, all the FMLA does is protect your job with your employer while you are on leave. That's pretty much it: It means you can come back when you're done. It gives no provision that employers must offer compensation for time not worked due to illness/pregnancy/whatever. Whether you are pregnant or caring for a sick relative, the only way to receive pay for the time you are not working is to use up any benefit time which has already been accrued.

Sorry for agreeing with your admin on this one...

[telerib.livejournal.com]

You're right - that is all FMLA requires.

However (http://www.opm.gov/oca/leave/HTML/childbirthfs.asp), the Fed has policies that go a bit beyond it with regards to what you can and can't use your sick leave for. FMLA is a minimum; the Dear Spouse, for instance, gets 2 weeks paid paternity leave from his company, which FMLA doesn't require, but his company gives anyway.

There's a lab-specific protocol that says the same thing as the OPM website, so I should be good.

[aemccurry.livejournal.com]

You are woman, which means you're either supposed to be childless and a wage slave, or a housewife and mother. After all these decades, the gummint still hasn't figured out working moms.

Of course, I've heard it's actually worse if the husband tries to take parental leave of any length.

[telerib.livejournal.com]

I believe that, even though the regs seem to enforce equal conditions. (The husband, to use sick leave, would have to show that he's caring for his wife during her 'period of incapacitation.' That would be FMLA-covered, and the federal regs allow up to 30 days of sick leave to be used for the care of immediate family.) First, you have to convince your HR staff to agree with your reading of the regs. Then, you have to deal with the unstated office opinion that husbands shouldn't take long paternity leave - that seems to be more the problem.

The trouble is, the regs are written in government-ese. They use the exact same language to refer to this normal and anticipated "period of incapacitation" as they do to the totally unexpected trauma of a car accident. It's a "medical emergency."

Now, I really do hope that my entire childbirth experience comes and goes without the words "medical emergency" being needed to describe them. On the other hand, some recovery time is clearly indicated, and if the doctors say six weeks is standard, I'll believe them.

But now you've got an admin who's reading this thing thinking, "This isn't an emergency, so it doesn't qualify," because "emergency" colloquially means "something time-sensitive and critical." It isn't until three pages later that there's the text block seems to indicate that yes, it does qualify.