The Family Medical Leave Act was made law in 1993. It is to basically require your employer to hold your job for you if you need to take leave up to 12 weeks for the health of yourself, your spouse, or a natural or adopted child. My principal suggested that I apply for it the day of Richard's accident. In order to do that, I needed to contact my school district office and ask for the apporopriate paperwork. My paperwork asked for the health condition that prompted the request and asked for a medical release so that they could verify that the issue was a reality. I also had to have a statement from an attending physician. This was difficult to get because he was under the care of a trauma doctor in ICU that we really didn't see too much. I ended up giving it to the nurse and she saw that it was filled out properly and returned to me.
The hardest part for me was having to take time without pay. It didn't take me long to run out of sick and vacation days so every day I took off, I didn't get paid for. Richard's hospital was 100 miles from our house, and I had two children living at home. We were so fortunate to have a place to stay in Albuquerque so we didn't have to get a hotel, but there were still meals to buy because we didn't have a kitchen to really cook in. Then there were the trips back and forth between home and the hospital. At work they had a sick bank that you could use other people's sick days if you needed more than you had. It didn't apply to me because it had to be for personal health issues. Since it was Richard's health issues, they wouldn't allow the sick bank days to work. I even had friends that wanted to donate days that they had accumulated to me, but that wasn't allowed either. It was frustrating!
I also needed to fill out similar paperwork for Richard. I was not of the presence of mind to think about this, but fortunately for me, his HR department contacted me to initiate the paperwork in his behalf. I had a medical power of attorney so I was able to sign paperwork for Richard, which I did fairly often during the first couple of years. I also met with his HR division to go over benefits that applied under the conditions.
Richard always felt a need to be "over insured." If there was an optional insurance at work, he would get it. For that reason, he was covered for "short term" disability. We filled out the appropriate paperwork for that insurance while I visited with the HR representative. Richard started receiving checks from this disability after a few weeks. He was still employed at the time and we decided (HR and myself) that he would use his sick leave and vacation days first so that his paychecks would keep coming, at least until that was used up.
Here is the thing about short term disability. They called me one day to tell me that they would be overpaying me through that insurance and that I needed to be aware that I would need to pay a certain time period back to them. I said that that was fine, but I did not expect what actually happened. When we received the check, there were taxes and government fees taken out, just like on a paycheck, however, when I paid it back I had to pay the GROSS back. I paid more back than the original check I received. In reality, I would have been better off it I had never received that check! They didn't tell me that part, and they didn't give me option of not taking the money for that time period. I am not sure why this is the case, or was the case under our insurance, but be mindful of this, especially if they call and say they are going to over pay you and you will just need to return that extra money.
In the end, I went back to work part-time before the 12 weeks was over (for my sanity more than anything else) and full-time toward the end of the school year. Richard never went back to work. He was able to use all of his sick leave and vacation pay and then fall under short term disability. He also had a long-term disability policy, which did not kick in until after the short term disability had ended, as well as his employment. He was not terminated though until after his leave was used up and then the 12 weeks FMLA had been used up. By that time, we were in August of 2008 so it took six months to get to that point.
If you have any questions, let me know. I will answer them to the best of my ability.
Next time I will discuss the Social Security disability process.
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