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Updated: Mar 14, 2021 148 Comments · by

Coffee Break: Crystal Wireless Charger

Coffee Break

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I just bought wireless chargers for my new(ish) iPhone, sadly — otherwise I'd be jumping on these beautiful crystal chargers. I'm a sucker for anything agate like this, truthfully, but I particularly love when you can replace some ugly-but-functional thing with something pretty AND functional. Hooray! Prices seem to vary pretty widely — I found it at FreePeople, where it's $40, but Saks OFF 5TH has it for $30.

(By the way, this is probably news to no one but me, but wireless charging is SUCH an upgrade. My iPhone 7 suddenly died right before Christmas and I was reluctant to upgrade to a really new iPhone, so I just did a baby upgrade to an iPhone 8 — it's magical not having to fuss with the cord anymore. Three cheers for wireless charging!) 

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Comments

  1. Comfy jeans

    Does anyone have recommendations for really comfy jeans? I have cords, but it’s jeans weather and I gained the COVID-15, so it’s time to shop! We are reopening next week and I can wear to work and something very comfy would ease me away from leggings / pajamas.

    I prefer mid-rise (vs mom jeans) and for it to have a regular fly (vs the pull-on styles which seem to look like maternity wear given my new shape).

    Thanks for any suggestions. Would like for them to be wearable with flats.

  2. Legally Brunette

    Hello everyone! Been reading here since 2008, but I don’t post much anymore since moving to CA, as the time difference makes it hard to get my comments seen in the abyss. However, I continue to enjoying reading everyone’s posts.

    I recently read about the Devacurl scandal with horror, I have been using those products for many years now and have hair loss. And I don’t have much hair to begin with, so this has been very disheartening.

    I need suggestions on new hair products to use for my fine, curly hair. I need control to set my curls but nothing too heavy. Thanks.

    • Anonymous

      Following as I have the same hair. Devacurl never worked for me and just noticed that my fav salon has switched to inner sense product. Do you have a link to the scandal? Never heard about it before. I’ve heard good things about mop top custard but haven’t tried yet.

    • NY CPA

      I have also had hair loss over the past year or so and had been using their products exclusively for 5 years. It’s been devastating. My wavy hair is coarse, so not sure how helpful this is, but I’ve been enjoying the Not Your Mother’s products. It doesn’t hurt that they smell DIVINE.

    • anne-on

      I have thick wavy hair (between a 2b/2c) and used the DevaCurl wavemaker and gel with no issues, but I did figure it couldn’t hurt to switch. I mentioned it to my stylist and he suggested the Davines brand, or Oribe’s curl/wavy lines. I find that products for true “curls” are a bit heavy for me, and the Davines curl cream was the same. Sadly (for my wallet) the Oribe’s curl creme is a dream. Le sigh:
      https://www.oribe.com/oribestorefront/oribe/en/Collections/Moisture-%26-Control/Curl-Control-Silkening-Creme/p/400376
      I’ve also had good luck with Carol’s Daughter in the past – I think there’s a new target line by Traci Ellis Ross that’s gotten good reviews too.

    • curly sue

      I abandoned the Devacurl line about three years ago, mainly because it was expensive and seemed to stop working on my long, fine, 3A/B curls. Since my concern was primarily budget, I decided to start with the cheapest supermarket line that I heard good reviews about, Tresemme, and I’m seriously so happy. I should have switched years before I did. I use their curly-formula (green lid/accent color) shampoo, conditioner, mousse and gel. Target is always running buy-4-get-$5-giftcard deals, so I try to buy there when I can, but I like that I can just pick it up anywhere when I need it. Maybe give that a try and see if it works for you?

    • Curly hair

      Switched to Curlsmith and love it. I use the three step detox scalp washing system and some styling soufflé stuff and it’s fantastic!

    • Beaglelover

      Hi, I had some hair loss a few years ago, and found the Christophe Robin products at Sephora to be really nourishing. YMMV, of course, but the curling creams also seem to work for my very very fine 3a ringlets.

  3. Anon

    Maybe better posted tomorrow on the mom’s site, but wanted to give this a shot here – has anyone voluntarily taken a very short maternity leave? For a variety of reasons, my husband and I are starting to TTC right now and if we were to be successful in the next month or two (might happen, might not), I would have a variety of work commitments right around when I’m due that I absolutely could not completely be absent from. At my age (36) I’m skeptical I’ll get pregnant quickly, but I also don’t want to wait to start trying. Has anyone taken a particularly short maternity leave in the 2-4 week range? I’d likely have to work throughout at least a few hours per day. Obviously I could have a medically complicated delivery or not get pregnant for 6 months and be well outside that window, but I’m trying to get a sense of how practically feasible taking a super short leave would be. Assume that we can throw lots of money at the problem (night nurse, etc) for the first few months if needs.

    • Anon

      I know people who have done it, and people who hoped to do it and then didn’t. Your body is going to make that decision for you, not your workload.

      • Two Cents

        The only person I “know” who did it was Marissa Mayer, former CEO of Yahoo, and she built a nursery next to her office at work and had several full time nannies helping around the clock. This is not a feasible situation for 99.9% of moms. The main reason why such a short maternity leave won’t work is because you’ll be a sleepless zombie at that point (not to mention that your body is still recovering from a huge ordeal). It’s neither safe nor practical to be back to work on no sleep. You could do it for a day or two, but you’ll be so miserable that I urge you not to do this.

        If you switch to formula right away and hire a full time nanny and a night nurse, you would be able to get your sleep at least. But still, don’t do this.

      • Anon

        When I worked in retail and manufacturing, I knew several women who were back to work at 2-3 weeks postpartum. Financial necessity is a powerful motivator. It’s more common than the professional world thinks.

    • Anonymous

      I don’t think you can plan on this at all. As someone who got pregnant the first cycle on both pregnancies – you still have no absolutely idea what your postpartum timing will be like. I spontaneously went into labor on my first at 38 weeks when my water broke on my evening walk. I had planned to work at least up to a week before my due date. On my second pregnancy I had twins and had to take maternity leave early because of complications later in my pregnancy. You just have no way of knowing how things will go.

      You MIGHT be able to have a 2-4 week maternity leave but cannot rely on planning that for a specific event or being available for a specific work commitment. You may have no complications or you may have a ton of complications but you don’t know that until you actually deliver. And you can’t even know for sure when you’ll deliver.

    • Anonymous

      Not quite, but I WFH during both maternity leaves and was at 100% billing requirements. Don’t recommend at all. Hard to manage nursing, newborn sleep / wake cycles, etc. But do-able. I didn’t have a choice. Many places only offer 6 weeks leave. Hard to find any childcare that will take a baby of <12 weeks where I live.

      • Anonymous

        Continuing my thoughts. Planning your labor and delivery and leave is a bit like planning what sort of car accident you’ll be in. The kind that you take advil for a couple of days after while you wait for your car to get fixed? Or the kind where you have hospital stay + surgery + physical rehab and finally move back home a couple of months later. There is just no way of knowing really. To have a situation with no margin of error (my situation) is reckless and any client expected to put up with that should flee. I am surprised that I pulled it off twice and never should have been put in the position of having to do that. But the clients should have been told (obvs they weren’t) and deserved to have left while saying bad things about “service with a very thin bench strength.”

        Planning = planning for failure, possibly multiple failures, possibly simultaneously or in succession. Doing otherwise is just hope, and hope is not a strategy.

        • Anonymous

          Yeah, wouldn’t it be a violation of legal ethics to return to work when you are a sleep-deprived, possibly drugged, mess and not to make contingency plans to cover your cases?

          • Anon

            To be fair, lots of women are still sleep-deprived messes at 12 weeks. It varies a lot and there isn’t one universal end point at which you become well-rested. Someone who can afford a night nurse is likely to be significantly less sleep deprived than the average woman returning from maternity leave.

          • Anonymous

            Nobody is well-rested at 2 weeks postpartum, no matter how rich she is.

          • MJ

            Hahahaha. I’ve never been tireder in my life than when I was on multiple M&A deals with short exclusivity periods, so sleeping 3-4 hrs a night for 2-3 weeks straight, or when I used to go to the printer for an all-nighter a few times a week, for multiple deals, a few weeks a month for months at a time. I’ve already been in that–I’m so tired this is not a good scene, and my law firms knew all about it.

          • Anon

            Yeah, my point was not that she’ll be well-rested, but that plenty of women return to work (even at 12 weeks or whatever) before they’re well-rested. If you wait for the baby to sleep through the night, some women would never go back!

          • Anonymous

            MJ, I know this is how Biglaw works, but I don’t know why it isn’t malpractice. A number of courts have already ruled that systematically overworked defense attorneys are rendering ineffective assistance of counsel. Not sure why it’s any more acceptable for fancy lawyers to be overworked than for public defenders.

          • Anonymous

            12 weeks and 2 weeks are very different. Nobody is in her right mind at 2 weeks. And maybe we shouldn’t be forcing women to return to work at 12 weeks.

          • Anonymous

            I think my medical resident friends got 6 weeks.

            To be fair, this is why I like debt vs equity deals. Debt keeps to a schedule. Equity is a hot mess scream fest sea of nonsense. I went to the debt side decades ago and never looked back. Even the jerks are better then the average M&A person.

          • LaurenB

            Anon who said nobody is rested at 2 weeks pp no matter how rich she is?

            I got full nights of sleep at 2 weeks postpartum. Know why? Because I delivered early, stayed in the hospital for 8 days to heal, and left my babies in the NICU and trotted down to visit them daily for the next 2 months til they were well enough to come home. So yeah, at 2 weeks postpartum I was home and getting a full night’s sleep and not being woken up by babies. I do not recommend this plan, to put it mildly.

        • LaurenB

          + 1 to Anonymous at 3:38 pm ( please, people, pick some names!). Perfectly healthy low-risk pregnancy – til at 31 weeks my liver and kidneys started to fail. This really isn’t plannable in the way you think it is. Even the most picture-perfect of deliveries is a major knockout to the body.

    • Anonymous

      The shortest maternity leave I’ve ever heard of was 6 weeks. At 2 weeks, even with a night nurse and formula you will not be sleeping. You will not be able to form a coherent sentence. Your body will be leaking from all sorts of places. You may not be able to stand up, or sit down, comfortably. You will be such a disaster that showing up for work will damage your credibility and your professional reputation. If these commitments are truly so important (SCOTUS arguments?), then you need to hold of on TTC for a bit longer.

    • Anonymous

      This is just a terrible terrible plan. If you truly can’t miss work then don’t try to get pregnant now. Two weeks might turn into one week depending on when you give birth. What if you have a rough delivery? If your baby had jaundice? If you have feeding issues? Or you’re just exhausted and recovering from a major physical experience and taking care of a new born.

      Go right ahead if you want to, but there’s a reason no one does this, you aren’t magically special-er than all of the rest of us and somehow superwoman.

    • Anon for This Only

      Are you thinking of working from home, or going into the office? Either way, this lawyer mom of three was nowhere near able to work a few hours a day in the 2-4 week range. After four weeks I did a little bit of work from home. I was nowhere near focused enough to handle heavy-duty or client-facing projects. Your mileage may vary.

    • Anonymous

      You know that first-time moms often deliver late, right? So if you are planning to go back to work two weeks after your due date, you could very well be delivering then.

      • Anon

        In the US, most OBs strongly recommend induction by 41 weeks. But yes, if the event is 2 weeks after your due date, there’s a good chance it will only be 1 week after your delivery.

        • Anon

          This makes me a little nervous given how often I’ve heard people complain about their OBs calculating the due date implausibly.

          • Anon

            It’s typical to have a “dating scan” in early pregnancy and those calculate due dates with great precision. They’re not just taking your word about when you had sex or missed a period. Risk of stillbirth and other birth complications goes up significantly in late pregnancy, especially past 41 weeks, and given that a baby is “fully cooked” at 39 weeks, the benefits of delivering by 41 weeks outweigh the risks, even if the due date is a little off. You’re entitled to ignore your OB’s advice but the medical consensus in the US is induction by 41 weeks and I don’t know anyone who gave birth in the last few years who hadn’t started an induction by then (inductions can be long though).

          • Anon

            What do they mean, implausibly? It’s 38 weeks from date of conception, which is up to five days after you have sex. If your periods are very long or very short, they will estimate when you ovulated (the baby usually does not implant if you ovulate fewer than 10 days before your period or more than 16). As mentioned above, early scans are quite accurate in determining gestational age.

            FWIW, the date I came up with (knowing when we had sex and knowing when I ovulated) was within a day or two of the numbers they came up with from calculating based on LMP and my cycle length, and from doing the gestational age scan.

    • Anon

      “Has anyone taken a particularly short maternity leave in the 2-4 week range? I’d likely have to work throughout at least a few hours per day.”

      Do you mean work a few hours a day throughout the 2-4 week leave? If so, know that you’re voiding your FMLA the moment you start working again, and you will need your company’s permission to take intermittent leave.

      Also, you will not be able to get anything done for at least a few days after giving birth. I’ve gone skiing shortly after abdominal surgery and taught myself differential equations while recovering from a surgery in college, and I couldn’t remember to brush my teeth or put on my new bathrobe after I gave birth.

      So… if that’s your plan, you need to find yourself a new plan.

    • Leatty

      I didn’t, but a former colleague only took a 1 week leave at a prior employer (who threatened to fire her if she didn’t return 1 week after birth). She had family to watch her son when she went back to work, but said it was horrible. I can’t imagine taking a very short maternity leave – I took 4 months of leave and the first 2 months off were critical. I didn’t have a night nurse, but I suppose that would have helped.

      If you’re planning to do any work during that time, you’ll need a nanny and you’ll likely need to formula feed (newborns can clusterfeed for HOURS). You should also expect to need a nanny when you return to work, as most daycares don’t allow infants younger than 6 weeks.

    • anon

      I would not plan for this to be an option. Most doctors recommend waiting 6-8 weeks to return to work after a routine c-section, which is a distinct possibility that you can’t really plan around.

      Also, I had so many grand plans when I was pregnant/before I was pregnant and then wound up on bedrest for half my pregancy with a micro preemie and a 2.5 month NICU stay. And I had zero risk factors and a long family history on my side of the family and my husbands of healthy full term pregnancies with no complications. Not saying that to scare you, but to point out that you really really have no idea what you’ll be in for. And the birth plan is just the first of one million things you will plan for as a parent that go completely out the window when life happens.

      Finally, I’ll gently push back on the idea that you cannot be completely absent from anything. Unforeseen things happen all the time and things carry on, what if you were hit by a bus and in the hospital during those events? I’m sure the team would manage to figure it out, having months to plan for your absence makes it easier to figure that out.

      Start TTC when you’re ready to have a baby. There will always be some work or other reason that makes the timing inconvenient. There is no perfect time to have a baby.

      • Anonymous

        This. You plan for a maternity leave like you will be unavailable and hospitalized, not like you’d be on vacation. It’s not vacation leave, you will be unavailable and hospitalized – just like if you were in a random car accident – you have no idea when the dates are that you will be out. Could be two months before your due date, could be your due date or a week later – you don’t know until it happens.

      • Anon for this

        Agree with all of this. “There is no perfect time to have a baby” has never been more true than for those who planned for 2020 to be the perfect year to have a baby and then Covid hit. But in general, there is so much of parenting that you can’t plan for and trying to plan around work duties will just lead to stress. Unless you are CEO of Yahoo or president of New Zealand (and didn’t even she take 6 or so weeks off?), I doubt there’s anything at work that only you can do. The beauty of a nine month pregnancy is that you have lots of time to train someone else to do the job.

        Take as much leave as you can get. Even if you don’t have any birth complications and you have a fantastic sleeper, you’ll still want those few weeks to recover and get used to a new normal.

      • anon

        This. There is no perfect time to have a baby, and it is highly unlikely that you will be effective at whatever in-person commitments you’re talking about 2-4 weeks after birth. I have easy pregnancies and deliveries. At 6 weeks postpartum I am still exhausted and bleeding.

        In many ways, the moment you get pregnant you and your plans are along for the ride. You have no idea if you will go into labor early or late. You have no idea if your pregnancy will be easy or difficult. You have no idea if you will work until you go into labor or be on bed rest for months. You have no idea if your kid will be a great sleeper or a terrible one. The good news is that with most pregnancies, your team will likely have a long time to plan around your absence.

        If you have the time of job where there is Major Thing that happens at a certain time of the year (tax season for accountants, etc) then avoid TTC that would give you a due date near the Thing. If you have Things throughout the year and Things that could change (trial settings for a litigator), then just go for it and deal with whatever happens!

        Personally, at various times I have considered delaying conception or ending nursing early to deal with trials and those trials never happened when they were scheduled to happen. (The most recent being just this April! Trial continued indefinitely and I’m still nursing).

        Good luck!

      • LaurenB

        To give you a sense – I planned my maternity leave thinking – and I’m embarrassed to say this – I’d learn German. I thought I’d be sitting around all day, just rocking a cradle or whatever. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. And I had a completely supportive husband, and cleaning help.

    • Anon

      I think you will get a lot of responses here mostly along the lines of – which I agree with – I think executing this plan is not wise and would be very, very stressful and hard.

      I agree with the poster above regarding concerns about violating FMLA.

      I would also think about what kind of precedent you are setting for other women in the office/industry that have babies later down the line. Either they see you do this and feel pressure to now too (even if they don’t want to) but also men/senior leaders may now pressure them too, like “look what so and so did 2 weeks in”.

      Finally, honestly, I think when giving birth is involved you need to shift your perception of what you cannot be completely absent from. I’m sure there are cases where this is true, but I’d bet they were fewer than we think and we are all more dispensable than we realize. Also, along these lines, I’m often a “client” at work, and honestly if someone I was a client of started contacting me in earnest two weeks after they had a baby, I wouldn’t be like “wow what a reliable go getter!” I would secretly think it was weird.

      Unless the situation is literally like you will get fired if you don’t return after 4 weeks or something. And I don’t mean anxiety that you feel like you will be, but like they have actually said that. Which, also, in most cases would be illegal.

      Just my 2 cents.

      • Anonymous

        Yes, as a client or your manager or your employee, I would seriously question your judgment and priorities if you returned to work 2-4 weeks after giving birth.

        • Anon

          This would honestly be my biggest concern. You’ll also get a TON of judgment about why you don’t want to be at home bonding with your baby. Frankly, you’ll get this kind of judgment if you return after the more standard 12 weeks, but I imagine it would be multiplied by a factor of about a million if you return so soon and everyone knows you had the option to take a longer leave.

        • Anonymous

          Even if they aren’t questioning your judgment, you’re setting a terrible precedent for other women in your group. Don’t be the reason the next person feels like they only get to take 2 weeks of leave.

      • Anon5

        Agree, especially on the precedent point. We had a senior employee “choose” to come into work for various events during her maternity leave and do some related work from home and it has been used as an example of commitment in a way that has really intimidated a lot of other women in her department.

      • anon

        Spot on.
        Paragraph 3: Seriously, please don’t be this person. You are setting an impossible standard for other women and yourself, should you decide to have another kid.

        Paragraph 4: Work will take and take and take until you can no longer give. None of us are *that* expendable. Most of us thought it was weird when Marissa Mayer did it, and she was the freaking CEO. And she’s no longer CEO, so was it really worth it?

      • Anon

        “I would also think about what kind of precedent you are setting for other women in the office/industry that have babies later down the line.”

        YES.

        I had a physically easy pregnancy followed by a long but uncomplicated birth (baby wouldn’t descend, needed a C-section), followed by a laughably easy recovery, at least according to everyone around me. My baby slept through the night starting around week 6. I was walking easily three days after birth, running at week 4, and writing articles for publication at week 6.

        I still took 12 weeks of leave and kept my mouth shut about that upon returning to work, because that’s… just so beside the point. No one needs that standard. I had put in a lot of work to stay healthy during pregnancy and had gotten very lucky to boot, and it just seemed that my family should be the ones to benefit from that, not some damned company. My baby got lots of fresh air walks and runs in the jogging stroller; my husband and in-laws got from-scratch pasta and curries; I got to bond with the greatest little kid.

        I will also caution new mothers that sleeplessness is a fantastic way to get yourself a nice case of PPD, and PPD will make you of no use to anyone for quite a long time.

        We just don’t allow new moms enough time to recover. This is crazy and wrong on so many levels.

      • Anon for This

        A former supervisor of mine said something like “To be indispensable is to have failed,” and I really think that’s true. In a workplace, no one should be indispensable. No one. It’s the responsible thing to do to make sure that those above, below, and besides you can take over for you if necessary. I think some people look at being indispensable as creating job security, but it hurts everyone in the end if the only person in the office who can do X job is no longer able to do it. Train, mentor, supervise, and collaborate so that your team can succeed.

    • Anon

      This sounds absolutely batsh!t to me as someone who had a pretty easy delivery and felt mostly physically recovered after about a week. Even with all the help in the world, the first few weeks after delivering a baby are about physically recovering and figuring out how to care for a baby. I would never voluntarily return to work after 2 weeks unless I was going to lose my job and desperately needed the money. My understanding is that in the US many doctors won’t even clear you for return-to-work until 6 weeks postpartum.

      • Anonymous

        That was my reaction as well.

        Honestly, OP, if *having a baby* is something you can barely manage to pencil into your schedule, maybe consider that after giving birth, you will be responsible for the life and well-being of a completely helpless human being and that is also time-consuming. It’s okay not to have kids if you really, genuinely cannot make time for it because your career is the priority. No judgment whatsoever. But a plan to take a 2-4 week maternity leave is madness and it is way less crazy, to me, for someone to just decide not to have kids because they don’t have time for it.

    • Anon

      i know someone who had to do this for their fellowship after their medical residency. it was not their first child. and they said it was horrible. granted, they did not have tons of money to throw at the problem. if you had help 24/7 and are not breastfeeding so you can sleep through the night, then maybe it could work if you could work from home. but that also assumes you have no pre/post delivery complications, a baby who is totally healthy, and that mentally/emotionally you are able to be totally on.

    • Anon

      A formal part-time schedule might be possible but the “doing a couple hours of work from home while officially on leave” is not allowed at many (most?) employers for legal reasons.

    • Jules

      I agree with the other commenters – you will not actually want or be able to do this, and you can’t plan the timing. I was on restrictions and then bed rest for about a month before my delivery, there was no way to plan for that. I was induced about 10 days before my due date because of the medical complications (high blood pressure) and had a relatively easy delivery, but I still felt like I’d been hit by a truck. I could not have sat for more than a couple of hours at a desk If I had wanted to. The exhaustion in the first weeks also was worse than I thought it would be.

      I was scheduled to do a jury trial, solo, about two weeks after my due date but once I found out I was pregnant I made plans to hand it off to a colleague on the assumption that I couldn’t be in a courtroom all day at 9 months pregnant. In fact, the baby was born on day 2 of the trial (the case settled that day, my colleague called and told me the terms of the settlement while I was between contractions).

      This is definitely a situation where you will make plans and the universe will laugh.

    • SC

      I didn’t, but my SIL was a resident when she had a baby, and she took 3 or 4 weeks off before returning to work. Apparently, residents’ training requirements limit the time they can be out without repeating the year. She was fortunate to have a healthy, uncomplicated pregnancy and an uncomplicated, vaginal birth. I never thought it was a great plan. I strongly suspect that a male resident who had a medical issue requiring him to be out 6 weeks would not be required to repeat the year, but I don’t know.

    • Anonymous

      This sounds like a very very bad idea.
      Other posters have made tons of good points about due dates, etc that you really don’t have control over, and I absolutely would not schedule an elective section just to coordinate with work. Also then baby will be early bc Murphys Law, and you’ll still be screwed.
      A year or so is plenty time for work commitments to slide or change.
      Heck, what if you don’t even work there anymore?
      I don’t know of any legit daycare that will take a baby less than 6 weeks, so you would need to have family help, or maybe a nanny (not sure about nanny rules?).
      What I found out while pregnant/PP with #2 – those all-important work things can pretty much always be handled by someone else for a little while. And when you try to listen in on a conference call with a 2-week old, your coworkers yell at you bc you should not be worried about work right now!!! (Lol)
      Unless this is one of those seasonal things… all the teachers’ babies are born in April for a reason… in which case you might want to decide up front if you would be willing to limit your TTC schedule based on that.
      You don’t know how your recovery will be, or how the baby will handle life on the outside.
      And timing is never perfect, but somehow it works out in the end.
      Decide if YOU and your husband are ready in your hearts (external forces be damned). Then, as long as you have a roof over your heads, go for it.

    • Anon

      I did with my youngest because my husband was a SAHD and I wanted to conserve my time off.

    • Anon

      As someone who conceived on the first try twice in my mid-30s, I would have DH wear a condom if there’s something at work you absolutely can’t miss 9-10 months from now. Even if you don’t end up conceiving quickly, a 1-2 month delay is really not much in the big scheme of things. I would not put off TTC for a year, given your age, but delaying a month or two is NBD.

    • Anon

      You can get pregnant the first time you try. Lots of people do. If you absolutely do not want to miss these events then wait few months so you’ll be like 6 months pregnant or less. Going back to work at 2 weeks postpartum is crazy. You can do it but it will be very upsetting to you physically and emotionally, more than you image now. Unless your job is like president of a country or a major CEO, it’s not worth it.

    • Anonymous

      Please do not post this on the moms’ site. It is mostly a nice, friendly, supportive little community. We don’t need anyone who talks like this over there.

        • Housecounsel

          I am wondering what was rude, too. I don’t think the question was rude, and I don’t think the honest opinions of experienced moms in big jobs need to be sugarcoated.

        • Anon

          It’s not rude, but it’s a little… out of touch? to seriously consider this. Someone who wants to voluntarily return to a job a week or two after giving birth because she has something she “has” to do at work doesn’t really sound ready to become a mother. And I say this as someone who loves my job and doesn’t believe motherhood defines me.

      • SC

        What? There’s nothing wrong with OP’s post. I’m a regular on the mom’s site. There are frequent questions from people who are thinking about TTC or who are pregnant asking if a plan for childbirth, childcare, return to work, etc is feasible. The posters there give candid advice, occasionally phrased rudely. There’s nothing wrong with posting here too, but I think the majority of the regulars on the moms site would welcome this question, and it’s not immune from rude comments. (Not that the responses to this post have been rude anyways.)

        • Anonymous

          The OP is obnoxious and out of touch with reality. As a mom who gave birth while in law school and had to complete academic requirements while on “leave,” I find the question downright offensive.

          • Anon

            I feel like you may be taking this too personally. She was asking a question and hasn’t been fighting with anyone in the comments. Sounds like she probably doesn’t know many moms so truly doesn’t know what it will be like, which is why she asked…

          • Just as anonymous as you

            Seriously??? The fact that you are offended tells me you’re the one with the reality issue here.

    • Anonymous

      A senior lawyer I worked with a few years ago (in her 70s now) was a professor at the time she had kids. She had her baby on Friday and was teaching on Monday. She seemed ok with it 30-40 years later. Myself, I could not stand up for more than a couple minutes at a time for a few weeks after my first delivery so I remember that totally blowing my mind. And then I had a much easier 2nd delivery and realized it must have worked for her given the particulars of her own delivery and health.

    • DLC

      Caveat: I don’t work in big law or finance or what not. I am a freelancer in the arts, working on project based assignments. But I wanted to give you another viewpoint. I don’t get maternity leave- that is the nature of being a freelancer. With my second child I went back to work a week after giving birth. With my third child I was back in the office four days after she was born. (My first child I had 11 weeks off, but that was because she was born 7 weeks early.) I also have really easy births with no complications (my OB has told me that I am very lucky). I think this is a decision you need to make for yourself, but this is what allowed me to do it:
      – the biggest thing was that my mother came and helped take care of the baby. I didn’t have to worry about childcare for the baby.
      – my husband has a stable, predictable job, and he is an awesome father to the other kids. Between my mom and my husband, all I pretty much did was work, nurse, pump, sleep, eat.
      – I worked from home when I was able to, and really managed my hours to get sleep when I could.
      – I was able to distill my work in the the bare necessities. I’m not saying I slacked off, but for example, I definitely would proof documents only twice rather than four times- things like that where the extra work I was doing before was only for my own neuroses.
      – my work team was very supportive- I got first pick on some assignments, and they offered to cover for me for other things. No one micromanaged my time or my work. No one told me I was crazy or that I shouldn’t be there- and believe me, I know they thought it.
      – looking at the big picture and planning some time off when the baby was six weeks (baby 3)/ four months old (baby 2). Knowing when the push would be ending and knowing that I would have that time with the baby then helped a lot on the days when I was asking myself if I was insane.

      I mean, I don’t necessarily recommend doing what I did, but it’s the kind of thing where you have to know your limits and know how to marshall your support people and your own energy to get the essential things done.

      • Anon

        I think there’s a huge distinction between a first baby and a second or subsequent baby. I know quite a few people who did shorter leaves with a second or third and it worked out fine, but with your first the physical recovery is often worse, plus there’s the whole learning how to take care of a baby thing, as well as learning how to breastfeed (if you’re doing that). And with your first birth there are more unknowns about how you’ll deliver. Once you’ve given birth vaginally once you have a proven pelvis (cracks me up, but that’s the medical term) and you’re significantly less likely to have a c section that will have you on heavy meds and activity restrictions for weeks.

    • Anonymous

      I went back at 6 weeks with my second child for many reasons that at the time seemed like the right call. I took 14 weeks with my third child and it was so much better. 6 weeks was hard and I would not recommend it at all. (I was in law school when I had my first child and took the full summer off.)

    • Ms B

      The Kid joined the family by adoption, so I did not have to deal with the physical side of things, but I worked part-time, meaning at least a couple hours a day, more or less all the way through my “leave” (notice the quotation marks). I was remote for the first three weeks, but was back in the office from 9 am to 1 pm three days a week after that. My billing those months ran about 65 hours a month, mostly worked when I was in the office or during naps (I went to bed at 8 pm during that time). I returned to work full time around 14 weeks.

      Not that this was not what I had planned. I had planned a “real” maternity leave for 12 weeks, but I wanted to go back to work when I was about 10 days in. I missed the office and my work and was not happy at home full time.
      A decent part of the issue was that I had a large deal that was a couple years in the works closing by the end of the year and I was not willing to let someone else bring it across the finish line, nor was I willing to take the cut in compensation that would have resulted if I did not close the matter. Also, at that point, I had been a partner at my firm for a number of years, so the choice was mine to make; many offices do not take well to an employee changing a leave plan partway through.

      I have no regrets about my choice, but consider whether your mileage may vary.

  4. anon

    I think zoom video calls (from my phone) make my boobs look even bigger than they are. If I hold the camera low, the girls are front & center, and if I hold it high, they are at a wierd angle filling the bottom of the frame. I know it’s not a big deal, but any suggestions for more flattering video?

    • Monday

      I usually position my camera so that nothing below my shoulders is even visible. Can you do that? If not, how about a solid, dark colored shirt so that everything sort of blends together?

    • Anon

      Move the camera back.

      Try out different tops and bras to see how they look on camera before your next call.

    • Ellen

      Put the computer on a book (I use Black’s Law Dictionary) so that no part below your neck even shows up. That way, no one can even focus on any part of your boobies. It’s alot easier then sitting on a lower chair, b/c this way, no one can see the table either, just from your neck up.

      I had this issue in court this winter, and got alot of attention from the court clerk, who spent alot of time ooogleing at my boobies, so I just started wearing turtelneck sweaters. He stopped ooogeleing after I told the Judge, so either way, it worked. FOOEY on men that look just at our boobies. We are women, yes, but we are so much more then boobies. DOUBEL FOOEY!

      • Anon

        I’m glad you said “DOUBEL [sic] FOOEY!” with regard to boobs; otherwise, I would worry that you’re an Amazon.

    • Anon

      This just made me think of something funny my boss did on a call. He has shelving above his desk with work materials. Every time he needed something on the call he’d stand up and reach for the shelf, basically thrusting his pelvis into the zoom camera. He of course had pants on but it was still hysterical. I think he’s be mortified if he knew but none of us wanted to be the one to tell him.

  5. Anonymous

    Inspired by a thread from this morning, what are your best and most actually useful ideas for a corporate women’s/ gender-equality employee resource group? Some ideas to start:
    – Bystander training, so you know what to do when someone is being harassed (useful beyond corporate environment – eg on commute or at conferences).
    – A discussion on how to run meetings and lead projects so women get the credit they deserve. For example, when women in the room echo each other and have each other’s backs (‘As you heard Susan say earlier, I really agree that…’) so that some mansplainer doesn’t get a head pat for something that originated from Susan.

    • Anonymous

      Book club – read and discuss books like nice girls don’t get the corner office and lean in.

        • Anon

          Yeah, sorry but agreed. Our firm does this occasionally (I think as a check the box so we said we did something, personally). I even read a lot (I think) in my spare time. But that still means I’m only reading 2-3 books a month, and while an “I am woman hear me roar” type of book is fine once in awhile, I just don’t want to read these in my personal time enough to make sense for a whole book club needed to be about them. Judging by attendance/enthusiasm at these, I think I am not alone.

          • Anon

            Also, there is zero chance any meaningful number of men will read these, so this is a sure fire way to make sure they aren’t included in any meaningful discussions that result.

      • Nesprin

        Minor point of order: Lean in has done more to set gender equality back than perhaps any other book I’ve ever read. If you’re not getting promotions, clearly its your fault for not sitting at the table, and for not having your spouse take on child care. This puts the guilt on the women being discriminated against instead of on the institutions that do not allow people from all backgrounds to succeed.

        • anonchicago

          +1 Cannot stand Sheryl Sandburg, her smug approach to the workplace, and the ways men have twisted this book to make themselves feel better.

    • Anonymous

      This training should be mandatory for everyone of all genders. It shouldn’t be the responsibility of the women to stop harassment and sexism.

      • OP

        Sorry, that should have been clearer – that’s for a group whose agenda is gender equality, not necessarily a women’s group.

        • Anonymous

          Exactly who will join a group whose agenda is gender equality? My husband attended one of these meetings at his company and he was the only man there.

          • Monday

            Unfortunately, this. Same for “diversity/inclusion” committees that consist almost entirely of people of color. Anything related to establishing equity needs to be mandatory for the whole staff, or else it’s just piling on extra burdens for the people who least need them.

          • Anon

            Yup. It’s the same people at all of these things, and unfortunately not the people that probably need to hear the message the most.

          • anon

            we have diversity/inclusion committees in all departments of my large employer, sometimes several subcommittees. They have an overproportional percentage of female committee members compared to staff levels, but also a good amount of men, mostly younger or middle aged. Lots of the female leadership are on them. Engagement is often rewarded with small bonuses, can be listed as an achievement in annual reviews. Some departments have made diversity/outreach engagement mandatory (I have mixed feelings about this, but they made it pretty broad, so whether you help revamp the hiring process, or just give guided tours to school kids, both count). The chief diversity officer reports directly to the CEO and gets a lot of visibility.
            Gender equality is not broad enough of an agenda to attract volunteers or get leadership buy in. If you go with diversity, equity and inclusion, that’s when you can argue that it’ll improve the talent pool from which your employer can hire, which is the only effective argument (imo) for achieving institutional buy in.

    • Anon

      Bystander training for only women is really offensive to me. Men are bystanders at least as often as women and we should not be perpetuating the idea that reporting and stopping harassment is solely the job of women.

    • Anonymous

      Nothing but having the guys in charge having only adult daughters (and not having any sons) — only then do they really see the world through our eyes.

      Maybe having clients saying “staff women” will get them to staff women. OTOH, I am not sure if that is entirely legal to mandate it.

      • anon

        FWIW your second paragraph is starting to happen. More and more clients are being express in their proposal requests that they expect diverse teams and some have fired firms for failing to meet those standards.

        • Anon

          +1 I’m not even sure I would say “starting to.” Diverse team requirements were a thing when I left Big Law in 2013.

    • Anonymous

      Access to clients and business leaders. I want events where I can mingle with the C-suite and meet clients and entertain my clients. Or at least I did before the world ended.

      • anon

        This. I want access that I don’t get since I’m not part of the boys club.

    • Ribena

      I mentioned the google #IamRemarkable sessions on this morning’s thread. I’ve found them to be incredibly empowering and although we run them through the women’s networks we’ve had mixed groups and they go down well.

    • Anon

      Hate the idea of bystander training. I’m not attending a women’s group to take what is basically compliance training and giving me one more task to do that isn’t helping my career.

      I would love a group that focused on seriously building a network, maybe starting by getting familiar with the members and the work everyone does. Connecting mentors with mentees and other things that will positively impact a career.

    • Nesprin

      You know, everything I came up with was related to getting the opportunities that others get through the old boy’s network.
      Access to management/ conversations about department priorities and opportunities,
      Opportunities for visibility within and outside of the organization (i.e. woman of the month),
      Ombudsman type access to problem solving when faced with potential inequality issues,
      Frank discussion of pay equality

  6. Anon

    Someone posted recently about wearing a jewel V-neck top for a zoom date. I want one! Ideally a true or faux wrap top. Any recs for brands or stores?

    I loved the style of the Nordstrom Bobeau faux wrap top Extra Petite posted about awhile ago, but it sold out quickly and was only available in black.

  7. Coronavirus testing

    Are there good links that you all know of that talk about additional + cases with additional coronavirus testing are either + people who get sick (and maybe are in early stages) or the asymptomatic + people who don’t get sick even though they are +?

    I keep reading news stories saying more testing / more cases, but do we know if they are finding sick people or people who are + who never would have presented for tests had broader community testing never happened.

    My city is just now expanding testing to people who you would have thought were in categories to have been tested sooner (exposed, symptomatic, nursing home workers, health care workers, etc.). They still aren’t testing random people. I have also read that now that meatpacking plants are testing all people, they are finding + people (but it doesn’t seem like those are actively ill people — if they never fall ill, it seems that silent + people may be really common, which is concerning, as the sick people will realize they are sick sooner or later). Also with the silent + people, do we know how long they are infectious?

  8. Anon

    I think I posted too late on the morning thread:

    Since people often recommend pelvic floor physical therapy I have to ask… is this a treatment where they’re putting their hands on or in you? How does it work?

    • Lilliet

      It can be both. I had pelvic floor PT that was not internal. It involved doing exercises and retraining muscles, identifying them by sitting on the bulb of a blood pressure meter, then the contractions of the muscles would squeeze the bulb and it would read out on the meter the strength. So it was essentially training my body to find the right muscles and strengthen them. This was enough for me, but I was told my issues were more mild than some.

    • Anon

      in my personal experience, yes, that was part of the treatment and it definitely made me uncomfortable at first, but the person i saw was amazing and made me not feel awkward

        • Anonymous

          I hate Kegels with a passion and will never ever be OK with this type of physical therapy. I have been considering a program called Restore Your Core, which claims to fix the problem with core strength exercises. You might look into it.

    • Anon for This

      I had it a few years ago and was absolutely NOT OK with the PT being inside me, so they worked externally. They used some sensor things to figure out how my pelvic muscles functioned, gave me exercises, helped me practice them without touching me. They had bands and stuff to use. It helped. I went weekly for 8 weeks, then my PT left. I didn’t like the new PT as much and it was getting hard to schedule it with work, so we stopped it and I continued doing the exercises. They also talked about how things like barre exercises can cause pelvic floor issues.

      • Anonymous

        That’s weird. Improving core strength actually helps with pelvic floor issues.

        • Anon for This

          Some particular exercises, not all of them. Should have been more clear. So she had me change some of the floor ab exercises (I don’t remember which exactly) slightly so that it would help, not make it worse.

        • Anonymous

          Not necessarily. Some pelvic floor issues can be due to hypertonicity (increased muscle tone)

          • anon

            Agree with 5:26. My pelvic floor issues are caused by overworked too strong muscles that are constantly engaged and don’t relax when they should.

        • Anon

          I remember when I was pregnant there being some issue with women who do a lot of Crossfit having more complications. I don’t really remember the whole deal, but sometimes muscles that are too tight cause issues.

    • anon

      I posted in the am thread about my experiences with multiple pelvic floor PTs, and while I would not send a teenage girl in unprepared, I also don’t think it’s as horrifying as you might imagine. It’s not as invasive or painful as a pap smear, and it’s not at all about sx. Most of it was about breathing excercises, and then trying to keep up the breathing while someone put physical pressure on muscles, either the inside muscles or just belly & back. As other posters have mentioned, there are other methods they can use, including anatomy education, but after years of pain I was willing to try whatever the PT recommended.

      • Anon

        I know it’s not sexual. I’m just modest and mostly concerned about dribbling urine when I sneeze or cough deeply.

    • anon

      I have been going to pelvic floor PT for about a year and it has helped my issues a lot! I highly recommend.

      My typical session is an hour long and is about 15-20 min of external stretching and massaging of my abdomen (no external touching on my you know what at all ever) and then usually the remainder of the session internal work. I don’t think the first or second sessions did any internal work though, it was something we discussed at length before going into. I am very comfortable with my PT who is extremely professional and I haven’t found it weird. I’ve even gone to PT when on my period, and I’ve just let my PT know whether or not I was comfortable doing internal work that day (the PT is fine with it but sometimes I feel weird if it’s a heavy day). I’ve also just had to get up to pee and come back and it’s fine.

      So basically, yes, it’s internal work but a good PT will not make you feel weird at all and has seen everything under the sun. I can give you the practice name if you’re in NYC.

    • Anonymous

      I did pelvic floor PT, and the only internal work was the initial evaluation and the reevaluation at the end. Everything else was done out on on the PT floor and consisted of doing variously exercises while clenching my pelvic floor muscles.

  9. Sloan Sabbith

    I’ve been posting under No Longer Anon, but after Marie posted in the AM thread asking about me, I decided to switch back to Sloan Sabbith. Hi, guys. I’m back. ;)

    I can’t really talk about this in real life, but just want to tell someone how excited I am: I found (and bought) a gorgeous large Proenza Schouler PS1. I got $700 I wasn’t expecting and did not need to spend responsibly (job is stable, have a good emergency account, no debt, etc), and The Real Real had an amazing pink and burgundy PS1 20% off plus $50 off for signing up for emails, so I got it for ~420. I know PS1s were mostly a thing ten years ago, but I have never stopped wanting one. And my favorite colors are pink and burgundy, so I’m SO EXCITED. I will be modeling it in my nicest yoga pants and sweatshirt when I get it…..and then debuting it sometime in the far off future when I’m back at work. ;)

    Is there anything you’ve wanted for many years that’s no longer “in”?

    • Anonymous

      I recently bought myself the pair of Frye Harness 12Rs that I’d been coveting for like five years, even though they are no longer the thing. Now I have nowhere to wear them. I was even going to wear them with dresses this summer.

      • Anon

        I have a pair (and have had for 15 years) and every time I wear them I get SO many compliments. I only wear them a couple times a year now (unlike every free second back in the day), but I still love them.

    • Anon New Yorker

      I used to have a black one and sold it and sometimes regret it. What I regret more is buying the “large” size because I thought it would be more practical. If I had bought the “medium” size I’m pretty sure I would still be using it. They are beautiful bags — congrats on your find!

      • Sloan Sabbith

        Hmmm. OK. I compared the size to my Lo and Sons Brookline for size comparison, I plan to use it as a workbag. The medium seemed like it would be too small. Crossing fingers it works!

    • anne-on

      I loooove the celine clasp top bag. Mansur Gavriel knocked it off pretty well but I still prefer the look of the OG ;)

    • Anon

      I was informed on this site that Valentino rockstud flats are “out” but I want a pair anyway.

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