Maine needs paid family & medical leave. Here’s why.
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“Sadly, there were no options for me. I had to find a way to make my job and caregiving work. I tried to keep all the balls in the air. This couldn’t last. I not only crashed, I was burnt out.”
“Access to paid leave is a privilege that allowed me to care for my mother at the end of her life. It quite literally allowed us to continue providing a roof over her head.”
“If we had paid leave then there wouldn’t be that burden of having to go back to work when there are things that really need my focus more than that. But if I want to keep a roof over our heads, food in our belly, oil in the tank. I have to work.”
“People shouldn’t have to worry if they have a Zoom call at 2 pm or need to go into the office, all while having back labor, or wondering if their mom’s going to die in the next 8 hours.”
“I felt guilty about being out two months earlier, but I was on the couch and I was in bed. I wasn’t out and about. I was in pain. I was having a very hard time.”
“I was the primary breadwinner, and the one holding our health insurance for our family. So, I felt this pressure to minimize my time off. I had no time to respect the needs of my own pregnancy. ”
“I was still in pain when I went back to work. I would have moments where, if I moved too quickly, if I stepped wrong, my incision would hurt.”
“We had her on Thursday and my husband was at work on Friday. He worked Saturday. Sunday he had off. Monday he had to return to work. ”
“As grateful as I was that I could have that support, very soon within a few days of giving birth, my mom went right back to work. I was left alone as a teen mom who didn’t really have any resources, friends, or any other family in Maine.”
“To have 3 months solid with my baby, and to have my husband with me for the first 6 weeks was incredible. I don’t think I could have survived the first 6 weeks without him. That first day, that first week that I was alone with her was so overwhelming.”
“It is a tough time to discover that Maine does not offer Paid Family and Medical Leave when you are in a medical situation and unable to figure out nuanced things, like how to get medical bills paid.”
“I wish that our current law makers knew more about child development and the extraordinary impact of a positive bonding experience for both mothers and fathers.”
“With no paid family and medical leave, I only had 1 week of paid vacation. I worked three jobs throughout my entire pregnancy so I could save money for a decent maternity leave.”
“We were able to be there with him the night he took his last breaths. We wept and comforted one another. What if I had been 500 miles away just so I could be at work? ”
“When my partner was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in 2020, she needed significant care. I had paid leave through my job and I was so grateful to be able to take the time. It would have been difficult and dangerous to have other people come into the house to take care of her.”
“I cannot impress upon you how hard it is to leave your baby, or your parents, or your loved one behind because you have to work — not knowing if that will be the last day that you see them.”
“We gave birth to our stillborn son at a local hospital and we were left in complete shock. In addition to the devastation, I quickly realized how I was going to have to navigate leave at work. Gratefully my employer gave me five and a half weeks of maternity leave, but getting paid for that time (meant I) had to go through our disability insurance which ran me through what felt like a gauntlet of inappropriate and insulting questions. My husband wasn’t as lucky to have five and a half weeks off, and after a few days he had to return to work. It was a nightmare I don’t wish on any family. ”
“Imagine that your baby was clinging to life - facing surgeries, always dealing with medical equipment and procedures, but you couldn’t be there. Imagine trying to do your job while your baby - your heart - is in a hospital. That’s the reality for most families because we don’t have a paid leave system for all workers. ”
“Paid family leave allowed me to meet my family and personal obligations while maintaining the financial security of a career I had worked so hard to build.”
“The last nine months I have sparsely utilized my earned benefit time (EBT), as I knew in order to have time off with my newborn I would need the bulk of that to still have an income while postpartum. Up until the day prior to delivery, I was working my full-time job.”
“When the doctor who finally diagnosed me told me I had endometriosis, she said I needed a very specialized surgery. The surgery took nearly six hours. Afterward came a long recovery period.”
“I got to be home with my baby for seven weeks — two of them using paid time off and three of them unpaid. I was required to pay back my health insurance premium for those three weeks. I also returned to work with zero vacation or sick time remaining.”
“My husband and I had to choose if our baby, who spends the majority of her day in my arms and at my breast, is ready to spend ten hours a day with someone she has never met.”
“I took the precious opportunity to spend time with my parents, time that cannot be replaced because my mother passed away on March 1, 2016.”
“My student had a sick toddler who was sent home from daycare - she missed work, which meant she couldn’t afford to maintain her spot in childcare which led to her missing more work and ultimately losing her job.”
“My son was in the NICU for 3 weeks. My husband had a good job, so we were financially prepared for me to take the rest of my leave unpaid. But what if that was not the case? ”
“More and more of peers are delaying or giving up on their dreams of building a family.”
“During my three months of unpaid maternity leave, I had what my doctor later told me was some of the worst postpartum anxiety/depression she had ever seen. I had a horrendous time breastfeeding. I was about to throw in the breastfeeding towel when we found out that our baby had significant food allergies. The formula we needed wasn’t covered by our insurance and would have cost us $700-$900 a month. I recommitted to breastfeeding and overhauled how I ate so I could feed my baby. I’m not sure how I could have done that and worked at the same time.”
