Have been put on the IVF waiting list and don't know how to tell employers...

[NotSureAboutAnythingAtAll]

I've namechanged for this, just in case, if anyone works out who I am, please don't say anything

I work as a nanny for one of the best families EVER. My job is fab and I never want to leave, baby is 8 months old, have been with him since 11 weeks.

Prior to getting this job my DP and I were having investigative stuff done as to why we couldn't conceive. We found out recently that based on what they have found, they can offer us one cycle of IVF.

Its all happened rather quickly and now I am panicking as I don't know what to tell my lovely boss!
I have already told a fib when I was having my HSG done, I said I was having an ultrasound because of painful periods so already I have decieved her and I feel terrible

I am worried because I don't want her to think I am a liar (which I clearly am..!) or think less of me because the outcome may affect my job.

Oh I don't know, I don't even know if I'm making any sense

Why would you need to tell your employer?
If you have a good relationship with your employer you could discuss how you have been offered IVF. However I don't feel the employer has any right to know.

Will having IVF affect your ability to work?

Why would you be a liar? Don't see why you should discuss your medical history in detail! Or are you very friendly?
You have worked there for about 6 months, presumably you'd work while pregnant (?), I don't see what the problem is. You're entitled to a life and family too.

GOOD LUCK

Sorry what I meant was I did see your bit about the fib but TBH I'd fib/be vague to my employer too if I was having gynae tests - none of his business!

Will the IVF itself mean you need time off work? You could just take those days as annual leave and don't need to tell your boss what it's for.

Personally I'd hold off from saying anything until you actually get pregnant - you don't need the extra pressure on yourself from telling your boss at this stage.

Hi OP, first of all I wouldnt worry about the fib you told your boss before - it is a very personal thing to go through and I am sure she would understand that.

Secondly, you need to find out how long the wait is likely to be before the IVF starts - some places can take quite a while. No need to worry yourself or your boss too early in the day.

I think it could be hard to keep this from your boss ultimately. The timing of IVF can be unpredictable as once you have been accepted onto a clinic's list for a certain month they dont give specific dates to you - you have to wait for your natural cycle to start and even after that the timing depends how your body responds to the drugs etc.

You will need time off. IVF involves a few appointments prior to the procedure, then the procedure itself involves daily injections and then there is the procedure of egg collection and transferring the embryos etc. The whole process takes a few weeks and although you can get away with only a couple of full days off for egg collection/embroyo transfer, the various appointments for the injections and monitoring might take a bit of time each day depending if you have to travel to/from the clinic - and it will depend on the clinic as to what time of day these appointments fall.

Can you chat to someone about the process so you are realistic as to what it means and then decide what to tell your boss. i would recommend being honest with her nearer the time but it's your call.

Best of luck with the treatment.

waves

tbh i would tell your boss as ivf is soooooooooooo emotional and stressful - if you are worried about what mb may say/find out then you are going to feel stressed and to make ivf work you need to be as relaxed as possible

normally you need a few months to get your body up to scratch with hormones/injections etc to give yourself the best chance so by the time you leave for ml you are prob talking in a years time

as nannies (well female ones) get older there is always a chnace that they may want children and you are not wanting/doing anything abnormal

you know where i am if you want a chat x

Telling your boss may have its benefits , she has had a child and probably understands the strains of getting pregnant.

Plus you ucan sometimes get leave that takes ivf into account . Id talk with your boss , you never know she may even let you go on work time, plus she will understand mood changing and help and support you if you are that close.

IVF is stressful and its best she understand if you are not feeling good hugs with the treatment and lots of baby glue ur way

Nick - your reply made me laugh, exactly what my DP said
Sadly, I don't know whether it will affect my work, I might react badly to the injections, it might affect me emotionally... I'm just think worst case senario here I guess???

Thank you to everyone that commented, I feel slightly better about my little fib now. I think my best course of action is to speak to the clinic directly and ask them the average waiting times for treatment as I think that will give me a better time frame with which to decide when/if to speak to her.

I only work 3 days a week so while it may not involve too much actual time of work, I think my main worry is how it will affect my emotions and indeed the state I may be in if it doesn't work.
In the 5/6 months I've been here I have really hit it off with my boss and I know all about her struggle to have the little one I look after (not IVF thou) so I suppose that makes me feel a bit guilty too because from a personal point of view I feel she would be very understanding but I'm trying to think about the impact it would have professionally iyswim??

I do however have a tendancy to overthink things WAY too much so there is that. I think I'm still trying to make sense of it all as well so all sorts of things are going through my head

Right, well.

We are starting the the IVF next month which has obviously happened really bloody quickly! They don't lie when they put you on the 'short notice contact' list...

Still have no idea what to say to boss, thought I'd have more time to think about it, but as its only been 3 or so weeks, I am just in a bit of a panic really. I have a co-ord appointment on Thurs so that will give me an actual time table to reference and make things a bit clearer in terms of time off (if any) etc. IT does however seem I will definitely need some sort of time off, and as the IVF will be happening June/July its all cutting it a bit fine!

Are there any other nanny employers that would have a view on this situation? How would anyone else go about telling their boss?

Of course you're nervous about telling your boss. The idea of her nanny possibly going on maternity leave might be a bit disconcerting initially but your personal life really is no one else's business.

If I had employed a nanny in your situation and you told me about the ivf I would be nothing other than supportive and offer encouragement. My heart would desperately want a baby to come for you and I would fully respect your decision not to tell me about the ivf until you became pregnant unless you really wanted to.

Do what is right for you, not anyone else.

Wow. Fab news

tbh you do now need to say to your boss you are starting treatment

good luck xx

I have an 8 month old (and a 3 year old) and have a nanny. I have a good relationship with the nanny, and I personally would probably be a bit miffed if she hadn't confided in me, but that is based on OUR relationship, so please don't take this to be a criticism of you!

My primary concerns as a nanny employer would be how the hormones would affect her ability to do her job, and how much notice I would have re time off. In my situation I could easily give time off, but not all employers are in that situation so your employer might find it more difficult, so any time off might be tricky for her.

With an 8 month old I would not be as worried about the hormones as say with my 3 year old. TBH, an 8 month old is less 'active' work than the 3 year old, so unless you react REALLY badly I don't think there would be any problems.

My other main concern is after you have the baby. What are you hoping to do? Are you going to take time off, and if so how much time off. Are you going to want to come back to work, and if so, do you want to bring the baby with you? There will be about an 18 month gap between your child and your employer's child so your employer may be ok with you bringing your baby to work, but may want to reduce your hourly rate because they are effectively getting a nanny share because there is another baby there.

All things for you to think about, but TBH, not much more than if you had conceived naturally!

do you have to tell your boss? if i was trying for a baby with my dp, i wouldnt tell my boss till i was pregnant, in case it took forever to concieve

I think if its a dream job then you obviously have a great relationship with your boss..

I am sure she will offer you support and understanding as anyone with any decency would..

best of luck with all this love.. hugs to you both

Hi Blondes - sorry I've been a bit quiet, this is all just a bit mental atm. Nothing but love thou. Will give you a call on Thursday night if ok? x

Thanks for all the replies, very reassuring

chitchat07 - your first point is something that is making me feel guilty too! My boss and I get on really well and I actually feel bad for not telling her - I think this is such an alien situation to me its clouding my rational judgement iyswim??

As I work 3 days a week and the clinic opens at 7am, I am hoping that this will reduce actual time off work, except of course for egg collection and embryo transfer and the fact I will be making a cross London dash to work for 9am, but I will be doing dry runs and taking into account timings for this so see how viable my journey is. I am also considering getting a cab to work to cut down on time, but will also be investigating the traffic etc.

I am fully hoping to come back to work with my baby, my boss said to me before if I ever had children she'd be more than happy for me to bring my child with me (totally randomly in conversation before I knew about the IVF). I would of course accept that my hourly rate may be reduced and would be fine with that. I may be getting ahead of myself but I was looking at double buggys (the icandy pear le le swoon) which would be perfect for a newborn and 18mth old, imo, and I could leave my charges seat at work, etc.

As a nanny employer who has been through IVF, these would be my questions/concerns:-

During your cycle you will have a number of scans. What time of day are these likely to be at and how much time off will you need for these? Will you be giving your own injections, or will you use a nurse? If the latter then again this will result in more appointments.

You will need to have at least a day off for egg retrieval, and again this will be at relatively short notice (though once you've started down-regulating it might be more predictable). You will also probably need a day off for embryo transfer, so I would need to make arrangements for that. You are in a better position of knowing your employer's circumstances than I am, but prior to telling her I think that you need to consider how she can manage without you - it may be hard to get short notice cover for a 10month old.

Pay:- I would be assuming that you would be taking this time off as annual leave, so if you thought that this was sick leave then we would need to discuss. I'm not saying that I'm right - I'm just letting you know my thoughts!

I guess that I would be less worried about hormones per se, and more concerned that you would be distracted during the treatment. It is hard not to get over-focussed on the treatment especially when your follicles are being measured etc. Rather than being hormonal during the treatment I would be more concerned about how you are after the IVF attempt especially if it is unsuccessful (as most are). I would probably have some concerns as to how you would cope with being with my baby whilst coming to terms with the possibility of not being able to have your own children.

Whilst you aren't giving any sort of formal notice I would of course take note of the fact that you are trying to start a family and therefore would be looking to leave my employment at some point in the future. Whilst that probably shouldn't change my view of you, it would obviously colour it somewhat. You will have only been working for me for 6 months or so, which is a relatively short period of time.

Hopefully you already have a good relationship with your employer and this is just a short term issue in terms of needing time off that can easily be managed. However if you have a less easy relationship with your employer it may be worth considering what your legal rights are, as if she doesn't agree to the time off you may be facing disciplinary action - obviously that is an extreme case, and one I would hope not arise in practice. If your employer is themselves an employee then they do have some legal protection to being able to take unpaid time off. Please don't be surprised if she isn't entirely pleased by the news - it will be less about you, and more about the short term inconvenience for her, as it is likely that you won't know the exact days that you need off until 48 hours beforehand.

Sorry - cross-post. Sounds as if you have a good relationship with your employer, so hopefully my worst case scenarios will not be an issue!

Good luck with the treatment!

Hi LadyMuck - while your post is very helpful and has given me a lot to think about, I really could have done without you so bluntly stating that most IVF attempts are unsuccessful. Not really what I wanted to hear...

Anyway, I have a lot to think about so thank you.

Sorry, forgive the tone of that post - I'm very touchy atm

No probs. Know you are busy at mo. I'm working Thursday so Anytime after 7.15 and I will have signal xxxx

as you and MB discussed bringing your own dc then hopefully that won't be a prob but the egg collection etc may be difficult to arrange childcare

do you have a nanny friend who may be able to cover for you so not making it hard for your MB to take time off

I can not stress enough you need to be in the best frame and as unstressed as possible so please do talk to MB xxx

I think the best thing to do this week is see what the co-ord appointment shows me in terms of times, dates etc!

SO much to think about

Thanks again everyone, as ever

Moi again... still haven't told her, thinking about mentioning it tonight but am being an utter wimp about the whole thing

I'm another nanny employer who went through ivf (and it certainly can work first time so don't worry too much about that bit.) I would want to be as helpful and supportive as possible but would like notice of appointments etc (as much as you can give) and some idea of whether you would want to be in work during the 2WW or whether that would be taken out of annual leave/ unpaid leave/ whatever.

I would also like to know that you'd thought through how you'd manage a) if it did work with ml etc and b) if it didn't work - whether you'd want another attempt very quickly and how to deal with the timings of it and whether you'd be able to cope with looking after my dcs.

Hi azazello, thanks for your first line

Thats a really helpful post, thanks. My clinic opens at 7am and I start work at 9am, although the journey is about an hour long, but I'm hoping any appointments won't cut into my work time, but I will of course mention this to her, in case I am running later for any reason, but it would always be with as much warning as possible - I may of course be lucky and everything might fall on M/F or the weekends when I don't work.. (crosses fingers) I assume for EC/ET I'd have to take a couple of days off here and there but assume I'd use my holiday days
if I am able to?

I've thought long and hard about the 2ww and I know a lot of women take it as time off but for me personally, I can't think of anything worse than taking those weeks off, I think I'd drive myself MAD. I love my job and looking after my charge really gets me through the day so no time off I think!

In terms of ML - I'd want to keep working as long as possible, if able to, and I'd in theory want to come back to work as soon as I am able to as well - I'd have the luxury of bringing my LO to work so in my mind it makes sense to get back to work asap - maybe I am a little nieve in this thinking??

If it doesn't work I def won't think about trying again until at least next year - this whole situation has happened so quickly that I just think I'd need to catch my breath before going through it all again!

Hope that all makes sense and that it is what my MB would want to hear??

Op, have you already discussed working with your own child? I realise it's a long way down the road but being positive when you have your own baby you do realise that your employer is under no obligation to let you come back with your own child? She has to keep your job for you but not for you plus child.