Has anyone used unpaid parental leave to extend maternity leave?

[Sirjester]

Has anyone ever used unpaid parental leave to extend their maternity leave? I planned to take a year off but I’ve been seriously ill for 6 months of that with a birth injury. I’ve just had a surgery for that but I’m upset I’ve missed so much of the time with my baby.

I can afford to take the unpaid time off. Has anyone ever done this? Did you regret having the extra? I was looking at using it for an extra 4 to 6 weeks off.

What about using AL so that you still get the pay side of it?

You can take parental leave, I’ve certainly known it be used like this.
I agree with pp use annual leave If you can, particularly if you use it to phase your return.

The other controversial option is to ask your GP for a fit note based on recuperating from your operation, not just physically but mentally. You had a birth injury that impacted you for 6 months until it was corrected. This option depends on how good or bad your employer is about attendance management.

Thank you, it was a big operation that I had so my work did temporarily put my on sick leave for it then back on parental leave as my DH had to take time off, so they have been pretty good. I’m not due back until December but would like to extend it to at least January really! I had six months of being in and out of hospital almost every other week and missed so much time with my baby.

I’ve had an extended period of maternity leave (18 months in total), and I was going back and forth on whether to take the final 6 months as unpaid leave or parental leave but I went with unpaid in the end because I don’t know how much of the parental leave I’ll want to use over the next 18 years and it didn’t make any difference as it’s all unpaid anyway. Would unpaid leave be an option for you? I’m so glad I’m taking the extended leave, I feel incredibly lucky to have had the first 18 months with my little girl as well as extra time with my older boy. My second is definitely my last and I won’t ever get this time with them again so I have absolutely no regrets about the money we’ve used to do it

My baby was in NICU for 3 months and I extended my maternity leave unpaid for an additional 3 months to make up for the time I didn’t have at the start. I think it was a an unpaid sabbatical. I thought parental leave had a limit of 4 weeks a year, though this may have changed.

When I did this my employer paid my holiday both accrued and accruing. Maybe I was just very lucky but I ended up getting more money than I had been paid. In mat pay.