lol. I don’t know if what you write will adjust anything. I think what you write says more about you than me.
I suppose if 4, 6, 8, or 10 weeks works for you when you personally have your baby (like carry the kid for hopefully 9 months and then push kid out), then more power to you. FWIW, most obs don’t see their post delivery patients for a full postpartum visit until 6 weeks, so I don’t even know what to say about thinking one can be at one’s total pre baby self at 4 weeks. Four weeks is definitely not even close to enough for all the physical, mental and emotional recovery for me after I had my first child. So I will admit, I may be a wimp. But I definitely won’t go around doling out advice about what’s normal or enough until I have actually gone through it myself.
I throw out those questions more for those of us who will be experiencing this phenomenon to allow them to make decisions for themselves. Ddscooks is making the initiative to plan ahead, in hope to minimize the hit for her family and also be realistic, so I think we do owe it to the upcoming female physicians to tell her what its really like. If she can cover her pregnancy and new babyhood income loss herself, then she also decreases the maternity leave burden for her employers, because it may allow her employers to find a locum to cover for her without her suffering much in term of financial stability at the homefront. The worst is when the new moms can’t afford to take sufficient time off but is also not able to be fully productive at work to meet quota. In that situation, both the new mom and the practice suffer.
If you look at the financial aspects, 3K really isn’t that much. Just for thought, how much time (office panels, calls, procedures or whatever clinical medicine) do you have to do in your field to general 3K? Most of us bring in at least 20K of income per month, so 3K/month is really not significant (this is especially true in a dual income family). If I decide to work even 2 less days per month after delivery and or cut back even more and go part time or less, the lost of income will easily be more than 3K/month (nevermind whatever other optional choices I make).
You're putting a lot of words in my mouth, that's ok. I'll just say that this is a financial forum, she asked a financial question, and there are plenty of other mom forums out there if she wants reassurance in other areas.
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