Vacation Time at your facility???

I put in a request off for two weeks in April, in which time I'll be going on my trip to New York City. I've worked in the ICU for one year, and have worked in my hospital 6 years. Some of that time I didn't have enough of an FTE to get vacation time, but I did previously take vacation time while I worked on Med Surg under a different manager.

So, my manager, who I really love btw, was showing us the April schedule to see if we wanted extra shifts. Upon looking at it, I noticed "Hey, I have just as many shifts that month!". Yes, she had squeezed all 8 of my 12 hours shifts into the other two weeks of the four week schedule. In other words, I wouldn't be working any less that month! I asked her "Hey, what's up with this?". She said, "Oh, that's what most people do in ICU, that way I can grant everyones requests for time off". I said "That's fine, but I need a break from work for my mental health, and I have a lot of vacation time accrued, and that's not how Peggy did it when I took vacation time previously under her". I compromised and had her take 2 of the shifts off. She told me that she didn't have to do that, that she doesn't have to give me any time off. I said "What are you talking about, that doesn't make sense that I wouldn't be entitled to some time off every year!"

We have a union and a union contract, so I asked my coworker that day what the rule was. She's involved in the union. She told me that, yes that's often the way it's done in ICU. I told her, I can understand not using vacation time for smaller requests off, but that I wanted an annual vacation and break from work. She's going to look into the language of the contract on that.

Any thoughts?