Aibu to ask my work not to contact me whilst on maternity leave?

[yellowowl]

Have so far recieved a text , voicemail and an email this week requesting information.

It's stressing me out , was up every hour since 1am with 4 month old DS , so really not up for thinking about work.

It's upsetting me as feel they are taking the pee . :(

I think your work are BU, but hopefully this should stop once they've got used to you not being there.

Perhaps you sopuld be less obliging and then they'll get the message! Did you do a thorough hand over before you left? I finish on Friday and have been handing everything over to my colleagues in stages so there'll be no reason for them to bother me!!

Hi, yes I did thorough hand over , made spreadsheets for the woman taking over my job. We had three handover meetings ! Grr

Has it been going in since you left? If you now have a four month old, you must have been on maternity for a while.

Yes I've been off since may. It ha been sporadic, but the last week has been too much !

coffee - if OP has a 4 month old then they have had plenty of time to get used to her not being there!

I would ignore the e-mail, accidentally delete the text and voicemail

It's actually against the law to directly contact you during mat leave, remind them of this and they should back off! Failing that just ignore ignore ignore

They prob don't realise and think you have got all the time in the world! I'd request for them to just contact you by email only and let them know it might take a few days to reply you don't want them phoning you although you don't want to be on bad terms with them when you go back . I'd ring them when you've calmed down , deal with this request and then ask officially to only be contacted via email x

Yanbu
Screen phone via voice mail, and wait several days b4 replying
Unless you've got their home number, n ring them at your convenience (1am nite feed for example)

Urgh, poor you, I feel your pain. Same thing happened to me, both times. DH also got a call from a colleague during his 1 week of paternity leave, over something soooo trivial ... unfortunately for her, I answered the phone whilst dealing with leaky boobs, bleeding nether regions and lack of sleep, and told her in no uncertain times to leave DH alone as he was helping me to look after our newborn and a lost stopwatch (yes, really) was not high on our list of priorities. She hasn't looked me in the eye since, and this was 6 years ago!

If I were you I would simply ignore all attempts to contact you. Don't return messages or reply to emails. They'll soon take the hint. I don't think you have any legal obligation to speak to them whilst on maternity leave...??

Congratulations

Try and ignore as much as you can....if they get shirty remind them why you are not actually there doing the job yourself...

x-posted! Seems they are not allowed to contact you OP, therefore ignore ignore ignore away!

Why didn't you tell them no the first time? You do not put up with this.

They have to keep you informed of stuff. Team meetings, HR stuff etc. but they should NOT be contacting you re everyday work stuff.

Don't reply, let them sweat. .

Thanks all!
It's probably my fault for being too obliging and eager to please (sigh) .
Have sent an email to my boss saying I am unable to reply to work requests at the mo, and can he let people know. Problem is , one of my colleagues is also a friend who has been contacting me ( about work stuff .. Where is this, where is that etc ) so feel a bit conflicted :(

If you want to go back I think it would be nice to be helpful. I agree with holly's advice to do it on your terms and when is convenient to you though. Especially if sleep is at a premium right now.

Mrskierhrichards - trying to be helpful, and I didn't mind at first .

I think you could do this diplomatically: "Dear Boss, DS is currently going through an "I will not sleep" phase, so where before I was able to help every now and again, I am no longer in a position to respond to calls and texts. I'm sure you understand, and will ask the team to speak to my replacement during my Maternity Leave rather than contact me at home".

Then send a text to your friend saying "DS seems to hate sleep at the moment!! Would love a catch up over coffee but can we keep work topics off the table as i'm just too tired to think about it at the moment"

if you aren't planning on going back I think you should maybe warn your friend that she needs to step up.

I think it depends what they are contacting you about, if its just someone cannot be bothered to look for/into something then totally agree ignore, if it was something important or an issue I'd been dealing with I would answer it.

This is just my opinion I was contactable with both my DC