Last Day of Work
This coming Friday will be my last day at work. It has been so slow in our office these days that I have been going through my drawers and carefully combing my desk about a million times to make sure I don’t leave anything behind that I might need over the next 12 weeks.
The company I work for is pretty awesome when it comes to maternity leave. I get 2 weeks off before my due date, full pay, and an additional 10 weeks off after I deliver the baby–at full pay. A lot of businesses only offer 6-8 weeks and sometimes at partial pay! I have heard of some mothers-to-be who work up until their water breaks. My office is about 25 miles from home, which is 1.5 miles from my hospital, so I couldn’t imagine working until the very last minute–no way! Not if I don’t have to!
Another great thing about my company is the health insurance. We did increase the coverage at the beginning of the year because we were expecting the new addition to our family and with so many OBGYN visits, the more your insurance pays for, the better. But they also offer a program called Maternity Support. As a part of this program, I participate in monthly phone calls with a registered nurse and earn points. By last month, I had enough points to apply towards one of about 20 baby items, free of charge! I did not have to pay for any portion of the item, no tax or shipping either. I ended up choosing a high chair. Although he won’t be able to use it right away, I know I will be glad that I have one for when he’s ready.
The calls are actually really beneficial. I always get all my questions answered from my What To Expect book as well as from my doctor, but the nurse with the Maternity Support program always brings up something I didn’t think about. Although she doesn’t have access to my medical files, she does know all about my health insurance and gives me insight into what is covered and what isn’t.
Everyone at work is pretty bummed about me leaving, especially my boss. He’s so worried that something will get missed while I am gone. And you know what, I kind of hope it does! I want them crying and begging and crawling on their knees for me to return. Which, of course, I plan on doing.
Ryan and I have a nanny lined up to help out with Baby Woods once he arrives and I need to return to work. She is a real find. Not only is she in our price range; but she has a lot of experience with babies, infants and toddlers; she has great references; and Ryan didn’t scare her away when he first met her–thank goodness!
The sad thing about hiring a nanny to stay at our house to care for the baby is that we had to fire our dog walker. The nanny is going to take Cali out for her mid-afternoon bathroom breaks so we decided to save ourselves a little bit of money and put it towards paying for the nanny. But we looooooved our dog walker. She was so great with Cali and always left us a daily note about how Cali was doing, if she had any issues or seemed sick or unwell. She also took Cali out on “dog park” days every-other Friday. These days were more hiking and/or swimming and less dog-parking, but either way, she took Cali out of the house for about 4 hours on these special days and we could always tell when returning from work on those evenings that Cali had a full, fun and exciting day with the dog walker.
Two more days and my maternity leave begins, can’t wait!!!
