To think that women without children should be able to take time off work too?

[Playfair]

Firstly I will say that I am 100% supportive of good maternity leave (and paternity / shared), and understand the importance of supporting women to maintain a career, care for children or whatever else they wish.

I also acknowledge that maintaining birth rates is critical for society. And that maternity leave is spent doing work in raising a child.

Reflecting on my company's good maternity policy (about 6 months paid) and also some other institutions that have announced paid time off for those undergoing fertility treatment, it leaves me wondering about those of us without children (by choice or otherwise).

I'm in my thirties and will never have children. I'd love to have a small amount of paid time off (in addition to usual annual leave) to do some lengthy travel for example. I can't see why we can't have access to something similar if you haven't used any maternity benefit by a certain point.

There would obviously be benefits for society & business from developing new skills, morale etc. As well as women in work contributing to economy and through taxation.

So,

YABU - Women who choose not to have children shouldn't be entitled to anything else

YANBU - Women should be able to claim a small amount of extra paid time off if they stay in a career and contribute to business and societies success

We populating the planet it's not for fun

Then homestly you can stop now, there definitely isn't a human shortage.

Idiot.

YABU. The benefit if you want to call it that is being humane to a woman who has just given birth! It's there so she can recover. It's not random "time off paid". We give people who have other medical events time off too. Shall we extend that to everyone? It's just nuts. No one would be working!

@Charcy convincing and thought out argument there.

Yeah six months maternity leave and a six month holiday jolly are not the same thing.
I get paid half my wages which I really can't afford but my baby is still up every two to three hours in the night and not ready for nursery and I'm not ready for work, so I need to take the pay cut.
Maternity is exhausting, isolating and full of household tasks, it's not a jolly.
You have annual leave for your childless jaunts.
Why do you need six months off for no reason?

In many countries in Europe there is a falling birthday. So yeah let's not completely stop.

From an environmental pov, yes there are far too many humans and it would be no harm at all if birth rates fell off cliffs.

However economic models depend on younger generations supporting older generations in their retirement, via taxation, service provision and so on.

Comfortable (or even basic) retirements depend on the next generation.

Yabu

Maternity leave is to recover from health impact of giving birth and to care for a newborn baby, often mums are bf, so can't go back to work immediately. To have no mat leave would be discriminatory to women who would have to give up their careers and society has moved on from that. Men can share in Pat leave now if and when woman feels she has recovered and wishes to share early care of newborn with her partner

Some jobs will let you take an unpaid sabbatical. It's ridiculous to ask for a paid one to go travelling. Look for a project or secondment that will be a break , if you work for an international company there might be opportunity to work in an overseas office or project.

But to ask for paid time off because you aren't using Mat leave is bizarre, of no benefit to your employer and frankly makes no business sense. We'd all love paid time off to do that but it's called AL and you get 26 statutory days a year for that in the U.K. Tag on some unpaid leave if your employer can spare you for months , but I suspect most won't be able to, or they'd be reorganising.

NRFT, but:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63457797.amp

Women still get discriminated against for maternity leave. Would OP want to share that too?

@LanaDooleyx3 thanks, I was busy so couldn't respond to their twisting of my words. They basically said some women's only achievement is being a mother which a lot of people would think is an achievement anyway but definitely not our only one. And now saying raising one is a different matter to argue their defence 🤣, its all part of being a mother isn't it. Bitches don't like it if you bite back.

It's not just maternity leave. My mum has 3 adult children 2 of whom are disabled. She's always expected to cover shifts. I can't remember the last time she had Christmas off.

Not the first time over the years that I’ve posted these points in response to this type of message or the “we are pregnant” brigade ( ie dads claiming pregnancy) - which does my head in.

Maternity leave isn’t a holiday. Save money and take a sabbatical. If you don’t have kids you can save a lot of money.

Whilst OP you might think that returning to work after a significant chunk of time off will be a breeze, many don't find this to be the case. Things move on in the workplace and you're often expected to hit the ground running as though you've never been away.
I'm in the process of supporting two colleagues who have been away for extended periods and so much has changed in that short time period: New processes, new databases, new staff etc. It's not just changes in the workplace either, it's you yourself. Many people suffer from Imposter Syndrome after an extended period away.

I have also seen many women use huge amounts of their annual leave to look after elderly parents - take them to hospital appointments, meet with social workers etc

I had to do this. Ditto with my fertility treatments. My mother had dementia and her carers would often phone me during the day because something had happened and they weren’t able to settle her. And my managers were not very sympathetic. My single, childless only child friend was treated like shit by her boss when her mother was dying of cancer. There is definitely a hierarchy of women’s caring needs with maternity/childcare at the top.

There is a motherhood penalty but there is definitely a single and/or childless penalty too.

And yes I was frequently up all night with my demented mother but I had no choice but to go to work in the morning.

But maternity leave isn't some magical bubble where you get protected from everything else in the world. My caring responsibilities for my DF didn't suddenly stop because I had a baby, it just meant I had even more to contend with.

Most people don't spend most of a year recovering from major surgery though, you're in the minority there. I could have (physically) gone back to work after 6 weeks.

I guess if someone could prove they're not going to have kids, for example if they've had a hysterectomy or gone through the Menopause then they could have alternative leave. But otherwise what's to stop someone taking their "non maternity" leave and then 2 years later they get pregnant and have normal maternity leave as well.

Ultimately OP, this was the wrong forum for this kind of discussion. I'd love to discuss how workplaces can be improved for staff who aren't parents, but on here it just becomes a bunfight because mums get it into their heads that you're talking about removing mat leave. Even if you've said nothing of the sort. And then it just becomes pages and pages of people telling you how rubbish their childbirth and mat leave experiences were. I'm actually astonished nobody has come along and talked about twins yet.

It's MN, so a focus on mums is absolutely to be expected, but it's got so polarised now that people can't see a proposal to help childless women without thinking it's some kind of attack.

The only people I've ever known who had paid sabbaticals were academics. Their sabbaticals weren't holidays, of course - they were a break from teaching duties so that they could go and work with a research group elsewhere.

I'm not sure any other forum would be particularly sympathetic to someone proposing a benefit specifically for women with no children. There's no logical reason they're worthier of a paid holiday than a man (with or without kids) or a woman with kids.

Paid sabbaticals do exist in other jobs. I worked for a consumer research/insight consultancy that offered them.

But only after 5 years service and you had to do something relatively concrete with it, planned and agreed with management.

Its a great idea, I wish they were more widely available.

This is so odd. To people without children really think mothers get such an easy ride? Really? There's so much evidence to show this is not the case.
FWIW I use almost all my annual leave for childcare holidays/parents eve/schools activities/children medical appts but I ALSO had a parent who did of cancer so took much annual leave to spend time with her, go to hospital appts and I now have a stepmother undergoing cancer treatment and have taken many unpaid days to ferry to chemo/radio/help my day. Childless people arent the only ones with other responsibilities. No magic extra paid leave or allowances.
Its not a race to the bottom.

This is so odd. To people without children really think mothers get such an easy ride?

Whete did I say they did?

🤣