I, too went back to work while Ian was in the hospital. WE decided that one of us would quit work after he came home. Since I have the insurance and made more, my husband quit. Yes, very hard financially. Luckily, we had not ever had much money, so we were used to being broke! His boss let him contiue to work a couple of evenings a week, but that was just too much stress on us. After seven years alone, it was hard enough finding any time after Ian came home, so we decided to sell the car and get rid of a few other things. So he did not have to work at all. Now, we are doing very well (2 years later). He just started his own business and I am on FMLA until this baby is born. Unfortunately, I will only get my 6 weeks pp unpaid with this baby since I am using all my FMLA now. But, life goes on.

Ian 12/26/01 - 26 weeks P/E & HELLP
#2 EDD July 15, 2004

Oh another thing about FMLA, it runs for a calendar year (though it may depend on when your employer starts counting). Thus as long as you worked the required hours in the previous year, you can take your 12 weeks of FMLA back to back if the year conicides that way (say you year ends at the end of december, you can take Oct, Nov, Dec under the previous years FMLA, and then if you worked the required hours the previous year you can take Jan, Feb, and most of March under the current years FMLA)

Erin

Moderator - First Time Moms, Parents of Preemies
Missouri State Coordinator
Mommy to Alex and Mason

I understand how difficult this is for you. I was able to be off while Aaron was in the NICU, but I had to go back the week after he came home. The first couple of months were very very hard and depressing, and even after almost 2 years, it is still horrible to have to leave him.

Luckily for Aaron, his dad got a night-shift job (since he was too small for daycare when he got out of the hospital), so he's cared for by just us. That makes it ia little easier to leave him, but it is still awful.

I understand. [:o)]

Sharel

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Sharel O'Connell
Local coordinator for Pittsburgh area
'Parents of Preemies' co-moderator
Survivor of Preeclampsia, HELLP Syndome, & preemie parenting
Future adoptive mom

Aaron (28 weeker, 5/2/02)
Kevin - DH

Thanks for the info Erin! I will remember that if we have another little one!

Suzanne

The best advice I can give for situations like that is that FMLA allows you to take that time off any time in the year. So take off the time you need after the baby is born (usually 4-6 weeks) and then delay taking the other 6 weeks (or whatever time you have left)until the baby comes home from the hospital.

Another thing is that you can use fmla time in small blocks of hours as well. So if you knew you wanted to leave work 1 hour early every day during the time she was in the NICU you could use your FMLA time to cover that as well. Most employers are pretty reasonable when it comes down to it, because they know (or should know) that FMLA is pretty flexible on how it can be used, like returning part time, splitting up the time etc..)

Erin

Moderator - First Time Moms, Parents of Preemies
Missouri State Coordinator
Mommy to Alex and Mason

Anyone else here a preemie working mom? I had to go back to work while Hannah was in the NICU[:(]. Talk about awful! I could only have 12 weeks off (without pay of course!). I had wanted to have some time off when she came home so I went back to work when she was stable in the NICU (My work and home were an hour away). But then it took longer for her to come home than we expected. I went back to work the day after she came home from the hospital. Family and friends tried to make me feel guily for going back to work but I had no choice. If I did not go back to work right then we would have lost our health insurance. My husband did not have insurance at his job. Plus we had gotten behind on bills. I have not had any break in working. She's two and a half now. My dream would be to become a SAHM. My DH will be a manager at the restaurant where he's working in a few months. Maybe then I could at least go part-time. I am a marketing director, so I don't know if my boss would let me go part-time or not. Oh, well, I could always find something else!

Suzanne