Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Ooo whee....2 in one day!

I just couldn't stop myself from posting this article. Like working and having babies isn't hard enough! This doesn't necessarily apply to me since I'm staying home with Bear, but I know plenty of people that it will affect. AND, it will definitely affect my son in that he will have to go to school with and hang out with all those kids whose parents couldn't afford to spend much time with them! One thing the article explains that I wasn't aware of has to do with why lots of workplaces lump maternity leave in with all short term disability. (Lowe's is one of those companies, by the way.) Short term disability only pays people a portion of their regular salaries, so people are encouraged to come back to work as soon as they are able. That just plain sucks, in my opinion! Why can't maternity (and paternity!) leave be considered a totally separate entity, so that moms and dads can spend the time they need with their new baby? Why do they have to go broke to do that? It has been proven (and the article touches on this) over and over again that new babies need to be nurtured, but with even shorter leave times, it is going to be even harder for new parents to do this. And heaven forbid that there be some sort of emergency or required bed rest! The people who experience that are just screwed, apparently.

From my personal experience, short term disability is hard to come by, anyhow. I applied for it, thinking that I was going to be going back to work at Lowe's part time. I was DENIED. Guess why?! Because I took Clomid to get pregnant...apparently that made my pregnancy a pre-existing condition and made me not eligible for disability.

Anyhow, I guess I'm done ranting for now. I don't do that very often, so when I see or hear of something that really gets me going, I feel entitled. Thanks for listening (well, reading).

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting stuff-- depressing, too. I had to use up all my sick time and half of my vacation for the year, and got short-term disability for the rest of my leave.

By the way, I took Clomid too, and my short-term disability was approved... maybe they didn't know!

abbysmom said...

I was lucky that I was even allowed to take short term disability since I had not worked for the company for exactly 52 weeks or more. I was at like 49. But since I was management, they let me. It was 60% pay after the 8 day waiting period and I was required to use ALL of my sick and vacation time. I took the whole 12weeks allowed by FMLA. I couldn't take any more without potentially losing my job.

Amanda said...

@lauren: I just remembered the full reason I was denied...it was required that you be at Lowe's for 6 months to be eligible for short term dis. I had only been there 4 months when I started taking Clomid, but had been there nearly a year before Barrett was born! But, since I took the drug less than 6 months into my job, they considered it a preexisting condition.

Amanda said...

@abbysmom: I was denied by FMLA for the guarantee of getting my job back, too. I think the gen. manager would have worked with me if I wanted to come back full time, but I'm really glad I didn't need the job. I would have been scared out of my mind about money had I been a single parent or if Max didn't have the job he has. The short term that I was applying for paid 60% pay after a 30 day waiting period. Isn't that weird? What are people supposed to do for those 30 days? Anyhow, I ended up just using all of my sick days. I had vacation days built up, but the policy was that you couldn't use them unless you had been there a year.

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