Fed up of hearing "you'll feel differently when the baby comes"

[Greeneyegirl]

Just venting really. Is anyone else having this problem related to mat leave? Where i work everyone has always taken 13.5 months off. 12 weeks full pay, 6 months stat pay, 3 months unpaid and then tagged bank holidays and annual leave to the end.

All my friends and family have also taken this amount of time off, albeit with different packages. I know of one person at my work who, 4 years ago, took ten months.

I started saving for maternity pay during the first lockdown, not loads a month but a little maternity fund and have upped my saving in pregnancy. However with cost of living, currently remortgaging, having a newborn in Jan meaning we will have to have our heating on etc. im going to struggle after 10 months. My plan is to take the 12 weeks full pay, 6 months stat pay (adding £1000 a month of my savings to this so i have roughly £1700 but this needs to cover my share of mortgage and bills) and then tagging on bank Holidays and annual leave. When i say this EVERYONE (co workers, friends, my mum, HR at work) laugh and say "oh you'll feel differently when the babies here, you'll want that 13.5 months". Im sure i will! I want it now, doesnt mean i can have it. Its like people havent watched the news. Our mortgage is looking like an extra £500 a month. Plus food and heating going up. Its driving me mad and im struggling to bite my tongue.

The other day i mentioned that i was so glad to remember child benefit as i hadnt thought of that and a friend said 'oh yeah, that will be nice, you can put it aside every week and buy yourself a treat at the end of maternity leave'. Erm, i was thinking yay we might be able to have the heating on so our newborn doesnt freeze but okay!

Anyway rant over. Im just fed up of people being so out of touch.

@Lcb123 at my work everyone seems to book in the year and then extend it closer to the return date to 13.5 months. They are encouraging me to do the same when i said 10 months. My boss kept saying she thought i should book in the whole year because 'ill feel differently when the babys here" they have advertised my cover for 12 month contract even though i repeatedly said im taking 10 months

I would recommend looking at the figures for your DH to do a month or two when you do go back, even if all he gets is SMP. You'd be losing less as he's the lower earner and I really think there's a big benefit in men doing it for a bit. It also eases the guilt a little. I mean, I didn't really feel guilty to be honest, but I did like that I wasn't dragging DS out early in the morning to go to nursery or whatever, which might have made me feel guilty and DEFINITELY would have increased my stress on returning to work.

@GerbilsForever24 I think ill ask HR to explain it a bit more to me then. It would also help DH transition to 4 days a week too as he is doing childcare one day but its a bit odd i suppose not having that maternity leave break before going back part time like i would

10 months sounds like loads to me. After my first child I started a new job when she was 2.5 months old (no maternity leave as such as I was a student before). To be honest, I wouldn't recommend this! For my second child I had 6 months paid leave (in fact I started doing some work, or preparation for work, a bit early so that I didn't have to be too full on once I officially returned full time). This suited me fine. More to the point, people shouldn't presume to know how you will feel, what you will want to do or what you should do.

Go back whenever it suits you.

My only advice is to think about how you want to use the annual leave and bank holidays. I didn't tag them on to the end, and instead used them to take every Friday off for 6 months! Part time working on full time pay, and helped ease me and baby into the new routine.

I know not every employer would allow annual leave to be taken like that, but mine was fine about it because it is far far less disruptive for me to take 1 day per week off than to disappear for a week or more on a fairly regular basis when they realise you have two year's worth of annual leave to take within a year!

Do you really have to make a decision now? Don’t put so much stress on yourself. I used to put in for the full amount for both my maternity leave and went back early on one of them. No need to decide now

same here for DS1 who is nearly 17. He was 2 weeks late and so I had to go back to work when he was 3 months.

I think its great that maternity provision is so much better now, but you take what you can afford and then enjoy the peace when you get back to work!

Yes, DH actually switched to SAHD for a while after and having that period where he was still officially employed and getting a small payment was helpful.

I think the rules have changed now so it would all be done via HIS HR department. There might be some issues if they've never done it before but I would think that it's pretty standard now. Some employers even offer enhanced pay for dads, although that tends to be during the initial paternity leave period.

I went back after 9 months, as my pay stopped at that point, and we couldn't afford to have just my husbands income! Everyone's different, and yes, agree, they are out of touch when people are struggling financially!

Ten months is more than enough. We I had dd, I had the maximum which was 6 months

I thought I would want 12 months mat leave when I had my son. I could have stretched my savings to accommodate that. However, after 7 months I was desperate to get back to work. I found it really hard being with a baby all day, every day and needed to get back to feeling like 'me' again. So, my reasons weren't just financial. Having said that, everyone I spoke to was understanding of why I wanted to return to work. I didn't face any issues with that.

Atm it looks like I'll be returning after 18 weeks (4.5months), officially going off on maternity at week 39! I have a few weeks annual leave I've held onto to put in front of that thank goodness (although kept getting asked to push that back!).

I keep revisiting my sums to try and make mat leave last longer though.

I'd agree with this - my DP gave birth and we split the left 6 months / 6 months. In hindsight going from breastfed on demand to a bottle while also attempting weaning wasn't the best plan, but I really valued the one on one time to work out what worked for the two of us! Now that I'm pregnant we're going to do something similar, but probably swap at 9 months.

It’s great you have the family help. That’s going to be invaluable to get through this a little better off.

I would echo what some other posters have said and just be vague about it. I know many people do want to go back, and some can’t go back etc. There are many circumstances.

But when babe comes it’s also not just about you. And no I am not saying think of the babe in a whimsical sense. I mean for example with our boy we ended up taking to the breastfeeding quite well and now I have decided I want to see that through to the year if I can because he really doesn’t react well to most formulas, and there are alternatives but it’s an expensive exploration (can only buy whole tubs for the special blends) and nights of screaming when it goes wrong. I also don’t pump enough for anyone that suggests that and my milk isn’t the freezable type. Typical really.

But what I am saying is you might change your mind. There’s really no point sticking your flag to the mast just yet.

Nearly everyone I know is doing shared parental leave, which we did also. I took 7.5 months, my partner took 5 months.

Was just going to add, (if he hasn't already) get your partner to check the Shared Parental Leave part of the contract. My partner was told this as he had thought he had a rubbish policy after seeing just the Paternity Leave section. But there was then a Shared Parental Leave section towards the end. The Paternity Leave section said no additional pay beyond the two weeks full pay. The Shared Parental Leave section gave him the same entitlement as for women. So he received 4.5 months full pay to be taken at any point in the first year. I received six months full pay, but mine was restricted to the first six months. Many of the men taking leave had something similar. In my company they get up to six months full pay also if sharing leave.

But what I am saying is you might change your mind. There’s really no point sticking your flag to the mast just yet.

Except... she can't change her min because if she does, they won't be able to afford to keep their home, heat their home or feed themselves? I think this is exactly the attitude that OP is finding so difficult. This sort of blasé response that, "oh well, you never know, you might change your mind".

I mean, I met a woman once who couldn't afford to take more maternity leave because she worked in a decent job and her and her DH earned equally and had costs accordingly. However, when her child turned out to have significant additional needs and was forced to give up work and become his carer.

However, she didn't just "change her mind" in this situation. Her and her DH had to make a lot of very tough decisions, most notably to sell their house to move somewhere cheaper and closer to family for more support.

That's quite generous but I agree that your DH should look into it, even if it's not as generous as this. I did some work for a firm changing their policy and it was a bit like this but less generous re timing - I seem to recall the men got 6 weeks full pay taken any time and then within the year of the child's birth could get the equivalent of SMP.

We'll definitely look at DH shared parental leave policy then! We had assumed he would take the 2/3 months unpaid after my mat leave to give 12 months of baby at home but perhaps there is a chance he will be paid for it!

That’s a very sad example.

The point I am making is not that OP will or won’t change her mind or have to make tough decisions. The point is really - I don’t know who it benefits for OP to say she’s going to return at x date. Her employer potentially but that’s about it. So to be vague is a wise move. Leaves all your options open.

Anyway I don’t really have anything else to add. Except Congratulations on your pregnancy OP 😊

I went back at 8 months. It was fine. I felt recovered from the birth, my baby had weaned onto solids and bottles and reduced breast milk to a bed time feeds, he slept a bit better and was crawling a bit. I thought it was good to be back at work and get my baby into a more permanent routine.

Shared parental leave didnt exist when i had mine.

I had 9 months because I couldn’t afford any more. There is no point being off for longer if you can’t afford to because you’ll have an active baby that is starting to crawl/walk and is into everything and you won’t be able to afford to take them out anywhere.

I once told someone I couldn’t be a SAHM and I was told I’d feel differently when I had a baby. Sure enough I had my baby and when she was 6 months old I confirmed I couldn’t be a SAHM and couldn’t wait to get back to work. The last 3 months of maternity leave were really hard for me and I wish I’d gone back a bit sooner to be honest. You might feel like you don’t want to go back after 10 months but go back because you have to but you might be really glad of going back, talking to adults and earning again.

I understand @OP. People do not only like to tell you how you should parent but how you should feel as a parent. It does become exhausting even when you know that it doesn't matter what they say.

I had 10 months off with mine as was on SSP with no enhancements, then my husband took the final 2 months as his company offer pay. It was a good transition for me going back to work and knowing baby was with her dad, and then slowly did settling in sessions for childcare. Tbh I was ready to go back at 6 months! But as we were in lock down childcare providers weren't taking on it made sense to have the 10 months.

People have different circumstances and people feel differently. I worked with a woman who had 3 weeks off and that included her annual 2 weeks in the South of France, they took the new nanny along with them. On the other hand I remember with one of mine when I had to go back after 8 months I was lying on the bed with the baby and sobbing because I had to leave her.

Enjoy your maternity leave.

You could be like me and get so bored on mat leave, and of the endless grind of newborn life, that you cut your leave short and go back early.

I saw one pay slip with SMP, went "OH HELL NO" and promptly arranged going back to the office as soon as I could line up my childcare.