Disability Leave @ 34 weeks

32 weeks

33 weeks


So, I got my wish and was put on disability at the 34 week mark! It was actually the suggestion of my MD, when we went in for our last check-up she asked her RN when I could be put on leave and the RN and I looked at each other and then to my MD and told her she was calling the shots! She said whenever I was ready she would write me out for back pain and edema....so I didn't put up too much of a fight! :) This way I scored and got all 3 winter holidays off! Unfortunately I will be right at the 36 week mark the week of Christmas, so we won't be able to fly back home to Iowa. But....we have planned a little mini vacation for next week....after J finishes his finals we are taking off to Lake Tahoe for 4 days and 3 nights! Not that I can go skiing or snowboarding, but we will be able to have some time to ourselves before little miss Maya makes her debut!

So, for those of you wondering how the whole diability thing works....we pay into a supplemental disability plan, so after the initial waiting period is finished we will get paid 70% of our regular pay, without taxes! So, when we initially signed up, the options were for a 7, 30, 60 and 90 day wait....well at the time we weren't planning on having a family so we chose the 30 day wait. And the disability pays until you are 6 weeks post partum for a vaginal delivery, or 8 weeks for a c section. So, for us, the sooner we could be put on disability the sooner we would be able to get the full benefit of our plan. This way....the plan will start paying by the time we are 38 weeks thru my post partum period. If I had waited and worked till I was 38-40 weeks, we still would have had to wait the 30 days before the disability started....so the plan would only actually pay for a few weeks after she was born....do you follow? So....anyways....it just means that I get MORE time off that is PAID! :)

It seems that it is the norm out here in California for nurses to get put on disability around this time in their pregnancies! I can just remember back to when my fellow Boise girls worked pretty much right up until their due dates! You were all troopers! Not that I would have been unable to do that....it is just nice that I won't have to! Plus, it is pretty scary being pregnant during this H1N1 epidemic!