peepnbiscuits

I have a question. I had a baby in November, and now I realize my manager hired me when I was 23 weeks along (or so) and so that was nice that she even took that risk, but I wonder about something. I was asking her, long about September or so how long I get for maternity leave. She paused, and said that I was federally protected for up to 12 weeks but "from a business standpoint and a managerial standpoint, I have to be honest, taking that much time will make it really difficult for staffing". She basically told me she did not want me to take the full 12 weeks. I was allowed 8 weeks because I had a cesarean delivery, I elected to take 10 weeks. Co-workers who were present for that interaction said she had no business telling me how long to take. Even one of the doctors said "screw that- take the 12 weeks!" I go back in about 3 weeks. Right now, despite this being our third child I don't feel ready to go back- oh physically I'm ok, I'm feeling ok in that respect but emotionally and mentally I don't feel good about going back yet. There are a few specific reasons- hours for instance and I don't know... My OB said she could write a letter saying I'm not cleared yet and I should go ahead and take those 2 extra weeks. Financially we're hurting, my husband's job isn't terribly well paying and is pretty much a blue-collar grunt work job. That's one reason I'm hesitant to take the two extra weeks but the other reason is that I'm scared that if I do take them, I'll be sacked. Oh I know she can't can me for taking time that I'm federally protected under but I'm not dumb, she could always find another reason. Again I realize that likely her hands are tied by higher ups and their "business" viewpoint, and it was good of her to have me to begin with. But I wonder if she has the authority to dictate to me how long I can take. Your thoughts?

Let me preface this by saying that I've been an RN for seven years, and I was an LPN for five years prior to that. I've been in job situations that have been challenging, frustrating, and certainly un-glamorus (come on, nursing has its own twisted glamor doesn't it?!) but I guess I've never been in a situation where I just...don't like what I'm doing. I think what makes this more complicated is that I had really wanted this job- I should specify, this is in an urgent care clinic- because it was in this urgent care clinic when I was 11 years old I decided I wanted to be in the health care field. Sort of a circle of life thing. I had all these weird warm fuzzies over it, and it's not what I had hoped. I am coming from 5 years of inpatient OB, postpartum and the ironic thing is that I was looking for a setting where I could utilize more of my nursing skills because in postpartum I felt like I was losing a lot of the complex assessment skills and things I had learned when I worked on cardiac and float. Well, in urgent care...it's more like putting them in a room, get a set of vitals and chart why they're here. The doctor will do everything else, you just keep 'em coming and make sure you sell them on the online health profiles- get them to set it up in the room. Maybe start an IV or run an EKG if needed. It's just not what I thought it would be, and I feel bad. I'm 37 years old and feel like I've made a really juvenile move. The other thing I feel I should add, because this might be some of the internal conflict is that I just had a baby on 11/11. I'm getting to the end of my maternity leave, and while this is our third kiddo, the prospect of going back is pretty saddening. But that just begs the question all the more: if I really enjoyed my job, wouldn't I be pleased to go back- or do I not like my job because all I want to do is be home with my baby? (Or a little of column A and little of column B, right?) So, I've been at this job since July. What would be prudent do you all (whomever is reading this anyway) think? How much longer do I give it? Do I give it any at all? How would I go about talking to my boss about this?! I feel like a total flake. "Oh yeah I've been holding out for this job since 1991, now's my chance! She was really impressed by that fact. So, that's my sob story. Chow down.