Maternity Leave Anxiety

At this point, I'm trying to find the calm in the storm that is "pregnancy and the working woman."  As far as I can tell, there IS no calm.  It's all rough and scary and unknown.  

Not to mention, I've been fighting with a runny nose for the past month, which I believe is allergies...just a note to you tree lovers out there:  people, you need to plant FEMALE trees, too.  Sure, the male ones are prettier, with their dumb flowers and pollen.  But cut me some slack.  My nose is about to explode.

I visited the woman that handles leaves yesterday, and she acted as if I was inconveniencing her by coming in at all.  I came out of the meeting feeling anxious and uncomfortable and looking for a brick that I could throw through the office window.  Not a good feeling.  (Disclaimer:  If by chance a brick ends up through that window in the following weeks...NOT ME.  Hi police!)

The deal is this...I can take my regular sick days off with full pay, then start digging into the 100 days of extended sick leave I have.  The extended sick leave is partially paid, which means it is my daily rate minus the rate of the sub they have to hire.  However, all of these fabulous days off are solely dependent on how "sick" my doctor believes me to be.  If my doctor doesn't want to sign off on 7 months of "sick" leave, then I am officially screwed.  I must return to work.

There's also the 12 weeks of FMLA leave I can take after the paid and partial pay is up.  Now that is completely unpaid, although you still retain benefits.  They throw a screw into the machinery by making you deliver the payments directly to the office instead of them paying it automatically for you.  

I wrote my doctor as soon as I got home, begging her to forgive me for making her fill out all this paperwork and asking her to consider the possibility I may have a horrible invisible illness after giving birth that would prevent me from doing anything strenuous (aside from eating cookies and watching 30 Rock eight hours a day.)  Unfortunately, I'm having serious doubts about any doctor signing off on that much time off.  Stupid ethics.

I hate this.  The paperwork, the uncertainty...it's making my stomach ache and my head hurt.  

Adding insult to injury, last week my doctor said I was overweight, to which I say...NO DOI.