It's been a bit of a roller coaster since my last post. I did go back to work that Monday for my full 10 hour shift. Less then an hour in I knew exactly why the doctors didn't seem too keen on me returning to work full time (even though they never told me not to.) There was a huge difference between puttering around the house and actually going to work. I was crampy, having some contractions and exhausted. I stuck it out Monday and Tuesday knowing that I had a doctor's appointment (and the day off) on Wednesday.
My doctor appointment went well but when we started talking about work, the doctor restricted me to 20 hours a week. It seemed perfect. My disability policy defines a disability as being unable to make at least 80% of your normal wage with a 7 day waiting period before they pay benefits. It seemed I would be able to get partial disability since I was working part time. I applied, but then they called me and denied me. They said that I would have to be out a full 7 days to be approved, even though their policy says 7 days of continuous disability and a disability is not being able to make 80% argh! So half the work means half the pay. If I was out completely I would get 60%. It feels like I am getting penalized because we are trying to keep things from getting bad.
After I realized I wasn't going to get paid full time I had another realization, my company doesn't provide health insurance for part time associates. My boss called HR for me and sure enough, if you average less then 32 hours a week you are not eligible. At this point I was really upset. How was I supposed to choose between working the 20 hours my doctor wanted me to and having health insurance, especially for the baby.
Luckily the next day (after a sleepless night) I remembered that I should qualify for FMLA and you can take it intermittently to cover shortened work weeks. I called HR again and they told me if I qualify for intermittent FMLA it will cover the hours that I need for health insurance. My doctor is supposed to get my paperwork in to them tomorrow or Tuesday. I am still nervous about being approved, but I should be. I've done some reading and most people who have a cerclage, even a preventive one, go out of work full time as soon as it is done. If I get approved then we just have to worry about money. That's a big worry but we will figure it out. Clay got laid off again at the first of the year, but he does qualify for unemployment so that will help us get by.
Tomorrow I have an appointment with the specialist. They are supposed to do an ultrasound to see if my cervix has shortened any. If it has I will likely be on full time bedrest. I'll also see what he thinks about my working situation (it was my normal OB that put me on 20 hours a week). I am guessing that they should be able to tell for sure if it is a boy or girl tomorrow, since they could almost tell 5 weeks ago. I'm excited about that.
We has family pictures taken last weekend. I realized that the only professional pictures we had were of our wedding and the NILMDTS pictures that we had done in the hospital. We both wanted to take some pictures with the picture we had of Kyler, so we picked a photographer who also works with NILMDTS. We thought she would be more sensitive to what we wanted to do, and she defiantly was. We has a lot of fun, got the pictures we wanted with Kyler's picture and some other ones with our dog, Ranon, and just us together. We have gotten a few preview pictures so far and they are great. We should get the rest of them later this week.
Other then the drama with pay and insurance, working 20 hours has been pretty good. I get to sleep in as late as I need to, take a shower as late as I need to (showers have been a huge nausea trigger), take naps and just rest almost as much as I need to. I have been mostly sleeping and lying on the couch since she changed my hours. I think that the last 3 months of being so sick and exhausted and still working full time really took it's tole on me so it is nice to recover.
No comments:
Post a Comment