How long was your maternity leave?

[stellablue]

How long did your work give you for maternity leave?

 

[happygirl]

10 weeks I think,

 

[EmJay2001]

When my dd was born in 2001, it was the first year that Ontario had the 1 year maternity leave policy. Before that it was 6 months.

ETA: I took the full year but did not end up going back to work. I stayed home 10 years before starting up again at the end of 2010.

 

[stellablue]

When my dd was born in 2001, it was the first year that Ontario had the 1 year maternity leave policy. Before that it was 6 months.

ETA: I took the full year but did not end up going back to work. I stayed home 10 years before starting up again at the end of 2010.

Wow-I need to move to Ontario!!!! Was your 1 year leave a paid leave?

 

[abdmom]

5 weeks. Not good. With child #2, I decided to stay home. That lasted for a year.

 

[jpgpmpcp]

6 weeks with both maternity leaves, but I was on bedrest with both pregnancies. I was off work from May - October with DD and April - September with DS...just to get them here!!!

 

[grafxgirl]

12 weeks both times.

 

[Feralpeg]

My company allowed 3 months. I took six weeks. I used vacation time I had accumulated because I didn't want to go without pay.

 

[Mickey'snewestfan]

I got 5 days paid, the downside of being a teacher is that you don't get to accumulate any annual leave, combined with the fact that short term disability policies (the way maternity leave was paid at my school) don't cover adoption. I did have FMLA coverage, which lasted until the end of the school year (my son came home in April), so I stayed home from April to August. In addition, because my school held back part of our pay to pay in the summer, I did get a small paycheck, they basically took that money (about a month and a half's pay since I hadn't worked a full year) and divided it up over 4 1/2 months, giving me about a 1/4 of a typical paycheck once I'd paid for health insurance.

 

[EmJay2001]

Wow-I need to move to Ontario!!!! Was your 1 year leave a paid leave?

Yup, mostly. We get mat leave pay from the government and depending on the company, they might top it up to your normal pay (UI pay is very low to me). I think my company topped up to 75% (it was 10 years ago) but when you factor in not commuting etc it was not bad at all. I was not working for the next two so got nothing, but my DH could have taken pat leave for some of it (not sure how long that is, maybe 4 months?) if he wanted to. Two guys from my team went on pat leave last year so some men do take it.

 

[laurie31]

I took 6 months off with both my girls.

I was very fortunate (for an American). FMLA rules meant I could take 3 months, but my boss allowed me to take 6.

(that was totally without pay, though. At that time, the position I had didn't have vacation time at all. DH and I saved up so I could stay home for 6 months)

 

[crashbb]

Wow-I need to move to Ontario!!!! Was your 1 year leave a paid leave?

Most new parents (moms or dads - well, dads only get parental leave, not maternity leave, obviously) are paid through Employment Insurance. Some companies (like mine) do "top up" this to some extent, but many don't. So, although the law says that you can have a year's leave (and that your company has to re-instate you), not everyone can actually afford to take the full year (i.e. they cannot afford to live on the amount they receive through EI).

 

[englishteacha]

The Family Medical Leave Act says my employer, a school, has to give me 12 weeks if I want it. We can take our leave with pay days, if we have them accrued, to have our leave paid. I will be taking about 4 weeks at the end of the year and have enough leave days to cover it. Then I'll be off with baby for the summer. In the fall, rather than taking several weeks off, I will be taking some Fridays off, also using my paid leave days. It will be easier for me to transition back to work that way, and also allows me to be with my students at the beginning of the year. (Oh, my school district pays us year round, every two weeks, so I get a full paycheck through the summer.)

 

[Coconut36]

4 weeks for a "regular" delivery
6 weeks for a c section

FMLA (assuming you meet the criteria to qualify) gives you up to 12 weeks off. Those 12 weeks run concurrently with any STD offered and is UNpaid time off. So after my 6 weeks of STD I had the legal option to take another 6 weeks of unpaid time off.

From former co workers it is my understanding that my company revised their maternity/paternity leave policies about 2ish years after I left and they are a bit more generous now with it also being easier for fathers to take paid time off as well.

 

[Southernmiss]

When I worked full time and had our 2 dss in 1994, 1997 I had 6 weeks paid. But there was a policy in which I accrued maternity leave.

With DS #3 in 1999 and DD in 2001 I worked part time for our church and had no paid time off, but took only about 2 weeks but I could come and go as needed or bring the baby with me for a few hours.

 

[DharmaLou]

6 weeks unpaid.

The only thing that got me through was that she went to my MILs house so she wasn't with "strangers", she was with her grandma when she was that tiny.

 

[bigbabyblues]

DSs1 - 12 weeks, unpaid. Hadn't been there long enough to have much sick or vacation time built up, and what little I did have was used between dr appts and maybe 1 or 2 days after the baby was born.

DS2 - 10 or so weeks, all of it unpaid. At that time, I worked 4 hours 3 evenings a week after DH came home. I could have taken 12 weeks according to policy, but I went back early.

 

[Pakey]

I had my son at midnight on Tuesday and was back to work on Friday. This was 33 years ago.

 

[EmJay2001]

I had my son at midnight on Tuesday and was back to work on Friday. This was 33 years ago.

. That must have been so hard to do.

 

[Disneychix]

I had short term disability kick in after 5 'sick' days. STD paid 2/3rds of my salary I think. I got 8 weeks due to a c-section but took 2 weeks before also as per my Dr. My work also has a program where they pay 100% STD for every year worked. With younger DS I had 10 years of service so I got paid my full salary the whole time I was off. I also think I took a few extra days using vacation time too.