Annie’s Maternity Leave

Annie had her baby! But sweet Wrenly came at 31 weeks, and while she is doing AMAZING, she has a long NICU journey ahead.

At only 5 days post partum, Annie returned to work. Annie loves her job, and during Covid she regularly (and selflessly) worked 80+ hour work weeks (all unpaid overtime) to care for her residents. She often slept there, frequently took care of Covid+ patients, and did the jobs of 2 or 3 people at once as they were often under staffed. She sacrificed SO MUCH for her job.

Paid maternity leave is available in some places, but not everywhere in the USA. While some companies go much further in supporting families, many do not- making maternity leave inaccessible for so many new moms.

Annie's six weeks of maternity leave is unpaid. She can have 12 more with FMLA- but it's also unpaid. These country-wide minimum standards make accessing this leave prohibitive if you are the sole provider of your family.

Annie will be saving some of her maternity leave for when Wrenly gets home (and some vacation days), but that means she has to be at work now, while Wrenly is in the NICU.

The nursing staff is so good, and the incubator is warm, but we want Annie to have every chance possible to be there for her baby.

Annie is an WONDERFUL mom, who is doing impossibly hard things. And the pressure of being there with her baby, while also providing for her family? Is incredibly heavy.

Let’s change that.

Let’s make her maternity leave PAID leave.

Let’s get her more days with her baby.

If you would like to donate, all of the funds will go directly to Annie to help cover the cost of her unpaid maternity leave.

Our first goal is $9,000.

Everything above that will give her even more days she can spend recovering from childbirth, holding Wrenly (essential for tiny NICU warriors!), and later bonding at home with her sweet baby.

It will (hopefully) take some of the pressure off, even when the potential long term medical costs related to having a pre-term baby start adding up.

We hope it will give her some space to breathe.

I don’t want this to go viral- just to be shared with people who actually know and love her. Annie is a private person, and I don’t want her to feel weird about it.

If you can think of people who love Annie, please share this directly with them.

I’m just hoping those of us who adore Annie and desperately wish we could do SOMETHING can come together and make a difference.

If you know Annie, you know how thoughtful and caring she is to everyone around her.

Let’s help her care for her baby.