The Best Friend’s Guide to Maternity Leave: Making the Most of Your Precious Time at Home

The Best Friend's Guide to Maternity Leave: Making the Most of Your Precious Time at Home





In the tradition of the best-selling Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy and Childbirth, the perfect gift for moms-to-be: a smart and friendly guide to enjoying maternity leave.

Every working mother knows that time off for a maternity leave will fly by. And just when you get the hang of the dramatically different pace and routine, it's time again to return to work. The refrain is all too common: "I wish someone had told me from the start how to make the most of my leave...I would have enjoyed it more!"

The Best Friend's Guide to Maternity Leave is the reassuring book for prospective mothers that provides this much-needed sisterly advice on managing and making the most of this precious and unique time with a new baby. From hard-won advice on getting a paid maternity leave to dealing with the emotional return to work; from tips on bonding with a newborn to unique activities that will memorialize the time together, The Best Friend's Guide is the book every new mother needs and that every wise friend will give her.With The Best Friend's Guide to Maternity Leave, author Betty Holcomb tells mothers the wonderful, funny, and sometimes uncomfortable truth about maternity leave. Holcomb, a veteran of two maternity leaves and a contributing editor to Parenting Magazine, takes a practical, non- gimmicky approach to trading career time for precious time with a newborn baby. Reading between the lines of the family medical leave act, she offers sensible strategies for every phase of maternity leave, including how to convince your boss that you really plan on coming back, juggling finances, recovering from childbirth, comparing breast versus bottle feeding, staying in touch with the office, understanding why your husband may disappear, and coping with your first weeks back on the job.

Holcomb tackles tough questions, asking for example: When the boss calls and the baby is crying, whoM do you put on hold? One standout chapter offers an insightful view of post-baby marriage and counsels working couples to explore "what it means to 'help' and what it means to 'share'--and how that difference can change your marriage." Other chapters include a fresh view of the mothers' cult of sacrifice. Holcomb suggests that each new mother needs private time to recharge batteries but also to integrate a new view of herself. Yet her wise words must be underscored with the knowledge that for many working mothers maternity leave is not an option. Ultimately, the issues raised here are compelling evidence for making parent leave affordable to all parents. -- Barbara Mackoff









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