20: My Improv Banker Husband (w/ Mom)

In college, my gay best friend and I joked that if you hadn’t found love by 40, you’d have a baby with each other.

20 years later, I’m pulling the ripcord.

From deciding on solo motherhood to choosing IVF, I’m Meredith, and this is The Backup Plan.

Hello, everybody.

This week, we are audio only.

So if you are one of the new YouTube subscribers, I’m so sorry, you just don’t have visuals this week, but you don’t need visuals because the content is more than enough.

Today, we have an interview with Diane Gatza.

I found her website when I was doing all of this research about how am I going to make the most of being a single mother by choice?

And she started her own company called California Maternity Leave.

She was an engineer.

She went on maternity leave and realized how difficult it was and then founded this company.

It’s for Californians, but she’s gonna be expanding later this year.

She helps you tap into how to get the most of your maternity leave.

And she turned me on to all these ideas and stuff that I hadn’t even considered.

Like there are short-term disability benefits that you can take on top of the maternity leave that you may get from your corporate job.

If you’re freelance, she also has some tips there too.

So she calls herself the Rosetta Stone of Benefits, which I really like.

And she’s worked with over a thousand women to help them make the most of their maternity leave.

So sit tight.

I thought I was maybe having this conversation a little bit too early, but she said that some of the stuff that you have to plan for, for the short-term benefits, you actually have to do it before you get pregnant.

So get ready for that.

In terms of updates for me and where I’m at right now, most of my prescriptions have been ordered except for the Zomactin, which has been particularly tricky.

Schraff’s has it, Freedom Fertility does not.

Walgreens apparently does.

GoodRx, the website for saving on prescriptions, they say that Walgreens has it, but man oh man, I’m having a tough time getting that through.

Getting the prescription transferred over has been really difficult.

The first time I called Schraff’s, they didn’t do it.

The second time, they transferred it to Freedom Pharmacy.

Third time, they say that they’ve transferred it, but it’s not showing up in my Walgreens app.

So it’s just one thing after another after another.

But beyond that, I have ordered a couple little goodies from Amazon.

I ordered some band-aids, which a friend of mine was like, you’re probably not gonna wanna use them because the irritation from the latex with all the injections you’re doing constantly is just gonna be too much.

But they’re cute band-aids.

They’re little pineapple band-aids, which apparently is a symbol for IVF because pineapple has something in it that’s good for fertility, I guess.

That’s what the internet tells me.

I also ordered some silicone pads because I just want to have something that I know my cat isn’t jumping on every day.

And unfortunately, both of my cats have made the kitchen counter their own.

So I can sterilize that as much as I like, but I just like the idea of having a nice little mat I can roll up and put away.

And then I also got this little device.

It’s called a buzzy bee, I think, and it’s a little vibrating device that you put an ice pack on.

And so you numb the area, and apparently the vibration kind of confuses the nerves.

So got that.

And then I got a shoe rack to hang over my door into my laundry room, because it’s right by my kitchen refrigerator.

And so that way everything is kind of in one spot, and that’s where I’ll put the sharps container and everything too.

I’ve also got Tylenol in there and some extra gauze, and I just, whatever I need to grab quickly, and I don’t want to dig for, that’s going in that little shoe rack.

I’m prepared, guys.

It’s coming up quick.

I have an appointment on the 28th to see if I have ovulated.

And if I have ovulated, then I start estradiol, estradiol.

And that’s something I can get at Walgreens.

I think that’s only like 25 or 30 bucks.

So going to pick that up soon.

And then when my period comes, that’s when I start the injections.

So I’ve ordered everything to arrive next week so I can just have it.

I just wanted to give myself a buffer to make sure I had everything ready to go.

I’m glad I started early because the pharmacy nonsense would have been really frustrating a week out.

So there’s a hot IVF tip for you guys.

Order your meds a week early.

I think that about covers it.

Nothing else terribly exciting is going on.

I get nothing else terribly exciting is going on.

I get my stitches out this week on my foot and it’s feeling great.

It’s feeling really good.

Anyway, let’s get to Diane’s interview.

If you want to check her out online, her Instagram account is California Maternity Leave.

A lot of great tips over there.

And she’ll have a link to her website too, californiamaternityleave.com, where you can look into the programs that she offers.

And maybe you’ll see me in some of the office hours because I am ready to get the most of what California is gonna offer me for this maternity leave already.

I’m planning, I’m prepping.

Thanks for listening, guys.

Make sure you check out Backup Plan Pod on Instagram and sometimes on TikTok.

I need to post more over there.

And definitely subscribe on YouTube.

I’m trying to get that up and going.

And once I get pregnant and there’s more of a visual component to the changes my body’s going through, you know, belly updates are gonna be over there.

So get in while the getting’s good.

All right, thanks for listening.

Let’s get to the interview with Diane.

I’m so glad that you could join for this, because I saw your site and I was like, oh my god, somebody does this for a living.

This is amazing.

This is so cool.

Yeah.

Yes, I do do it for a living, and it’s such a needed service, born out of my own, you know, pain and struggle and challenges with trying to navigate return to the leave.

So, yes.

So, Diane, let’s just start from the very beginning, like, give me a quick little introduction to who you are and what you do.

Yeah.

So I’m Diane Gatza, and I am the CEO and founder of California Maternity Leave Consulting, and I help women maximize their time off and their pay.

So they get the most paid time off to bond with their new babies and to heal from birth and all the other things that are going on.

So that way, you know, women can return to work when they’re ready or decide what the next step is for them.

Because, you know, here in California, at least that, you know, our laws are great.

We have a lot of amazing protections for our jobs, lots of ways to get paid, but it’s not helpful if you don’t know how to access it or what it means.

Because I’m just at the beginning of this IVF journey and looking up the benefits for that, I’m like, oh my God, there’s so many more benefits that I have to worry about.

And I went on the benefits website and was just trying to navigate what are my fertility benefits.

They’re not listed.

They say to call them representative for maternity benefits, they don’t even list fertility benefits.

It’s only because I know that they exist to tap into them.

So anybody who’s doing anything to explain any kind of benefit to anybody, you are truly doing the Lord’s work.

Thank you so, so much for everything that you do.

So you work specifically with Californians, correct?

Currently, yes.

And I do have plans later this year to actually expand nationwide.

And yeah, so it’s been a big, gosh, we’ve been doing this now for two years.

So it’s been okay, like, let’s keep learning, keep building, keep building.

And now I think it’s time finally, I feel the intuitive call to sort of expand.

And just serve more women in other states.

Because here in California, it’s great.

We have so many benefits beyond just like what our employers offer and just what’s in our benefit documents.

That again, if nobody’s explaining to you, you may leave on the table.

But that happens across the United States.

That’s just not a California specific thing.

But yeah, that really requires me and my team to get educated on every single state.

What kinds of job protections you have, what kinds of time off you can have access to, where you can get paid, are there state paid benefits, what are the taxes on those?

Because I firmly believe that women deserve to know and have easy access to this information.

It should be in bite-sized pieces.

It shouldn’t be some complex thing.

You shouldn’t have to push, push, push, push, push to just get information.

It should be simple, digestible and easy to implement.

It’s so stressful and it’s so, like at this time where you’re supposed to be zen, you’re supposed to be like reeling it in and searching from within and like following your intuition and going into this new beautiful time in your life, you’re like, which link do I click?

So for the benefit of like everybody listening to this podcast, because I do get quite a few male listeners as well, hello, gentlemen that are out there, and I do have like an LBGTQ audience too.

So not everything is maternity leave here.

Sometimes it’s paternity leave or just family leave in general.

So you are working with that as well, correct?

Absolutely.

I have to tell you, I work with even just hearing your story to begin with, I was like, yeah, I work with so many women who are single mom by choice, who go down IVF and are saying like, I’m not waiting for like a nuclear family to have children.

And so those women are entitled to benefits.

I work with a lot of men and women who use gestational carriers and what kinds of benefits they get, and the gestational carrier gets benefits.

I work with, basically I just kind of look at the two categories, you’re either a birthing or non-birthing individual or partner, and everybody has benefits.

So that’s the key piece is to understand that everybody has something and how do you qualify, and where do you need to go to look, and where are all the pieces you need to put together to make sure.

So yes, if there’s a man out there or somebody that, you know, however they identify with their gender, yeah, you may still be entitled to, for sure, leave, pay leave.

Yeah, if you’re starting a family, Diane’s your gal.

How many folks do you have working with you?

We’ve got a team, all of us together, around 10 people.

So yeah, I just onboarded, yeah, another staff member last week, who I’m looking to do, you know, especially more of what I do, which is like the strategic planning, because there’s one thing just to understand, oh, these are the benefits I have, right?

So let me just back up and say, my background is, you know, I’m a licensed engineer.

So I left an engineering career after 11 years and was like, it seemed kind of bizarre, right?

Like, how can I do anything outside of engineering?

But for me, engineers were trained to just solve problems.

So now I’m solving maternity problems.

So it’s not just explaining to individuals, hey, here’s your benefits.

Here’s what you’re entitled to.

It’s like, how do we get it?

How do we secure it with our employers?

How do we maximize it?

What parts can you work part time during?

What parts can’t you?

What parts are you not allowed to work at all during?

Where are you collecting money from?

What are the requirements of that?

And then, how can you negotiate with your employer?

For all of your listeners out there, I just feel like that’s the most untapped resource.

Some women and men feel like, oh, my employer offers nothing.

And I like to say, great, then you should go ask for something.

Because I’ve seen so many individuals that I’ve worked with go back, especially if you’re at a small company.

And I say small is like less than 50, 50 folks, especially at small companies.

There’s so much leverage you have to just ask for something.

And asking isn’t bad or greedy or anything.

You can just ask.

And if your employer says no, they say no.

But as one woman told me, she’s like, you lose 100% of the shots you don’t take.

After she went and asked, she’s like, I’m so glad I did.

And it also is just kind of a first step into learning how to advocate for yourself and your baby when they come, because baby doesn’t have a voice.

You have to be their advocate with their care providers, everything with child care, health care, everything.

So I think negotiating for benefits and just asking for something is probably one of the most underrated piece of advice that I can give to all of your listeners.

Just ask.

As you’re saying all this, question kind of comes to mind for me because I’m 39 at this point and I’ve been around the block a couple of times and I’ve worked at a number of employers and I know I have a better sense of what to have anxiety about when talking to your employer versus what not to have anxiety about.

In my 20s and in my early 30s, there are definitely things that I would have been like, I can’t talk to them about this.

I can’t talk about this yet.

I can’t, like if I go to my employer and ask for a little bit more information about the fertility benefits, I can’t do that because then they’re going to think I’m going to leave and like whatever.

So I guess the question I want to ask is, how do you kind of temper those anxieties a little bit?

I know, like I said, for me, it’s just time, time on the field, you know, where I just understand that like, I’ve gone to my boss and I’ve explained what I’m doing.

And I knew the kind of response I was going to get from him because I knew the kind of boss that he was versus other people that I’ve worked for.

And a lot of it does have to do with working in a non-toxic environment.

But what advice do you have for somebody who is looking to start this conversation with their employers?

Oh, such a great question.

I want to start with a little story, right?

Back in the day, I don’t know what year it was.

I think it might have been like the 50s or something.

It was a long time ago.

And there was, I think it’s either the four or five-minute mile.

I’m not a runner, but it’s irregardless.

Well, I think it’s a four-minute mile.

It might’ve been a four-minute mile.

Like nobody thought you could do it.

Nobody thought anybody could run a four-minute mile.

Might be a five-minute mile.

I’m not sure, but whatever number it was.

Nobody thought you could do it.

And then one day, some guy breaks the record and gets underneath the four-

or five-minute mile.

And then within three months, there was 20 other people that had done it, okay?

So I bring that up because it was possible, but other people didn’t believe it was possible till they saw somebody else.

And I always tell women this, and I have a course, Maximize Maternity 101, and I share stories of women that are successful with negotiating and bringing things up with their employer, and I encourage them.

We have live office hours, and I’m like, bring it up, ask.

I’ve seen this woman that done it, and this woman got eight weeks, and look, you just saw this woman on the chat, asked a question 10 minutes ago, and she got eight weeks.

When women see that other women, or men, I mean any gender, right?

Somebody else is asking and receiving, it builds up the ability to say, well, why not me too?

And if somebody else was able to get that, why not me?

And there was one woman in my course, oh my goodness, she was amazing, right?

So she, I wanna share this, because I think sometimes individuals are like, well, I’m at a big company, like I’m on a Fortune 500, or whatever, I don’t know, Fortune 1000 company or something.

And this woman worked at a big company, it was on one of those lists, and they have over 5,000 employees.

She took my course and was like, okay, they don’t offer any parental leave benefits.

You just gotta apply with the state, that’s all you’re gonna get.

They weren’t offering anything.

So she felt comfortable, right, after just kind of seeing other people breaking the five or four minute mile, like, okay, I’m gonna ask.

And she sent an email to her head of HR at this huge company, and the CEO, okay, at this huge, because she’s never met at this huge company, 5,000 people, and said, why don’t we have paid parental leave benefits?

I think we should offer something, or you supplement the pay we may get from the state, or offer this, or offer that.

I can’t remember what she asked for.

Anyways, they sat down with her.

They had a conversation, and then they ended up implementing benefits, not just for her, but for all 5,000-plus people who worked there, because that one woman spoke up and was brave enough to say, why not?

Like, why the hell not?

And so if anybody’s out there listening and thinks like, well, it’s not possible, I got a big company, or I’m a small company, or there’s no way.

Think about the guts that that woman had to go and reach out to the head of HR, this huge company, and the CEO, who she never met, and who sits probably in some corporate, beautiful office, and asks, and receive, truly receive, and not just for her, but for everybody.

So if anybody’s out there thinking, well, what about me, or what not?

That woman did it.

And she’s no different than me, you, anybody else.

She decided, I’m gonna ask, and I’m going to speak up.

Let me ask this, because I’m thinking about past jobs that I’ve had, and ways that I rock the boat.

I can’t help it.

I come from a long lineage of boat rockers, and I just have a hard time accepting the status quo.

And I’ve worked for bosses who were doing a really bad job.

And so I let their boss know, and then they weren’t there anymore.

And I’ve done a lot of, when I see a wrong that needs to be righted, and a justice that needs to be justified, I go forth and I do it.

So emailing a CEO to me is not like out of the box way of thinking.

But something I found at jobs that I’ve worked in the past is that HR kind of stands in your way a little bit.

Like the term human resources, they’re not really providing resources to the humans.

I find that they’re protecting the company’s interests more than they are there for the actual employees.

Would you say that there is like more success?

And this is a blanket statement.

I mean, it’s gonna be different for literally everybody.

But do you think sometimes navigating in and around HR is more beneficial?

Because sometimes I find that the folks at the top don’t understand the need of the employees because that HR band is like quelling the masses down below.

Maybe I’m getting a little anti-corporate, but have you found that in the past with folks that you’ve worked with?

I would say this, it’s different at every company because I also get hired by corporations and companies to come in and do policies, right?

But I will only work for companies who wanna create inclusive and equitable benefits.

I’m not down to work for somebody who wants to withhold benefits from their employees.

And I will say, I have had calls with HR individuals and CFOs at these companies who have said, you know, we just wanna hire you to help us in the back, but we think that women should go figure it out on their own.

And that’s not the kind of work I’m here to do.

So I politely tell them, like, I don’t think we’re a good fit, and, you know, your business model changes and you’re looking to serve your employees, then please feel free to reach out.

So I don’t work with individuals or companies that are not serving in that way.

But there are a lot of companies that do and want to provide benefits, but they don’t, sometimes they don’t know.

And I’ve spoken at HR events and things in front of all HR professionals.

And, you know, I share with them the perspective of like, look, I’ve worked with over a thousand women.

So these are the women working for you that may or may not be sharing with you what they love about your companies and what they don’t, how they feel about your benefits and they don’t, but guess who they’re sharing it with?

Me, because I get to hear her everything.

And so I was just sharing some of the insights and asking questions and asking these HR folks to kind of raise their hands.

And what do you guys think about this?

What do you think about that?

And I honestly feel like a lot of times they just don’t know.

And if they’re not polling the employees or if employees aren’t speaking up and saying, hey, a lot of other companies are offering paid parental leave eight weeks, 12 weeks.

I mean, I’ve seen it all the way up to 26 weeks at a lot of nonprofits and big tech companies and things.

So that’s not unheard of.

Four months is probably the standard here for companies in California that are offering something.

I mean, I’ve seen less.

I’ve seen eight weeks, four weeks, and things like that.

I believe six weeks is what my current company has.

Yeah, and that’s great, something, right?

But if women are asking and they’re not advocating and saying like this is something women and men asking and saying this is something they need, they don’t know.

So I’d say sometimes it could be, like I said, these HR folks that I worked with, or that tried to hire me and were actively trying to know healthy employees.

I’d say that’s the margin.

That’s actually a smaller group than this group that just has no idea or doesn’t know.

Like they’re so busy hiring people, onboarding, doing all of the other things HR does, especially if it’s like an HR of one, those men and women are doing so many things.

Parental leave is like such a sidebar thing, unless they have something, they don’t always have somebody going out on leave, so it’s so complicated to keep up on it.

But it’s not until us, like we start speaking up and advocating for what we need, that like it starts becoming a forefront issues.

But I will say this, the HR folks I’ve spoken with, who tell me that they do pull their employees, like what are you happy with?

What are you not happy with?

What benefits do you want to see?

The number one and number two thing is, number one is like flexible schedule, remote work, like all that kind of stuff.

And number two is paid perennially.

So, you know, when the HR is pulling the employees and asking, that’s what they’re gonna hear.

And then it’s up to them or somebody in the company to do something about it.

But I will say at the top, the decision makers, right?

The CEOs, the founders, the owners, the board of directors, whoever it is, those are the decision makers, right?

So we need to make sure that they know of what the real benefits are for having, you know, paid perennially.

It’s not just a cost.

It’s not just hitting their bottom line as an expense, but, you know, it’s retaining top talent.

They’re not having to hire as much.

You’re actually probably able to hire better employees and more staff.

People will stay with you longer.

You’re gonna get better PR.

You’re gonna get better press.

Like, you don’t have to worry about cancel culture.

You don’t have to worry about people going on Twitter or X or whatever it’s called.

And, you know, blowing up the company.

And when you have such a reputation, you’re going to get more applications.

You’re gonna get better talent applying for the positions because, you know, benefits do drive the workforce now, especially since, you know, a lot of us are of that childbearing age trying to like find jobs.

That’s a big benefit we look for now.

So I think companies are starting to catch on and it’s slowly happening.

I think there’s an interesting sort of generational shift too, because something that I’ve dealt with at companies that I’ve worked for, you know, when you do talk to some of the folks in HR about like, well, this is kind of the norm of what’s being offered, they say, well, when I was having kids, that wasn’t the norm and I didn’t get that.

So like, I’m fine.

That’s kind of a difficulty I’ve run into, but it’s interesting because as you have certain generations aging out, and then you have this whole millennial age group kind of aging into parenthood and, you know, I have friends who have kids in high school, so it’s kind of all over the place.

But once you have the next generation coming up and what are their expectations for what benefits are and such, it’s people just expect different things out of their companies.

You know, I was hoping, you know, or I expected as a kid as I entered the workforce that you would get a job at a company and you worked there for X number of years and then you retire, because that’s what I saw my dad do.

You know, he had a really good stable job with the government that just lasted his whole life.

And then I got out into the workforce and it was like, oh, I can’t, they’re not gonna promote me.

So I have to go to another company to get promoted, to get to another company, to maybe come back to this company.

And so now when you look at like what drives you to a different job, a lot of times it is those benefits.

And I worked at Netflix for a while and they had crazy fertility and maternity benefits.

And then that was the norm for me.

And then I got back out into the workforce to look for other jobs and was like, oh, that was, ooh, I could have taken advantage of some of that.

But you don’t know until you are in it.

And that’s what I think is so cool about what you’re doing and what you’re offering people is once you start looking for those benefits, you’re suddenly like, oh gosh, where do I even begin?

So I guess one of the other questions I have for you are, what are the pitfalls as women and men families are looking into these benefits?

How do you avoid them?

Those pitfalls that come up maybe, what do you look up?

What do you not look up?

Who do you talk to?

Who do you not talk to?

Yeah, no, that’s such a great, great question.

There are many pitfalls and I can’t tell you how many women I work with and they’re like on their second or third baby and they’re like, I wish I had met you for my first because I did this and I did that and I got back to work and I got up, I left this on the table or I left that on the table.

And there’s nothing more heartbreaking than hearing those stories, to be honest.

So the first thing I would tell your listeners to look for is look at your employee documents, okay?

That’s where you need to go first.

And request everything from your HR.

So if you’re thinking about getting pregnant, you’re getting pregnant, or you are pregnant, whatever, just go ahead and request everything from your employee documents.

So, hey, can you send me your employee handbook with all of our benefits, parental leave, and the things you want to look for is like paper and a leave, and you want to look for any kind of short-term disability benefits.

That is huge, huge, huge, huge, huge.

If you’re pregnant and if you’re a woman, you may or may not know this, you are disabled when you have a baby.

That is wild to me to even say, but for whatever it’s worth.

Can’t we have another different term?

Yeah, it’s literally titled under insurance benefits, like sickness, like disability sickness is pregnancy.

I mean, yeah, that’s a whole nother thing.

But regardless of the terminology and how antiquated it is, the benefit is there that women can get paid out when they’re under a doctor’s care.

For sometimes upwards of a year.

Here in California, you can pay for a year if you’re under a doctor’s care.

A lot of these policies that employers provide will pay six months, 12 weeks, I don’t know.

They’re all different.

Every single policy is different.

So I would tell individuals to look for that.

The big thing is, and I’m not sure if your listeners are planning to get pregnant, but you can get a supplemental short-term disability plan without your employer.

And nobody’s talking about that and it blows my mind.

You can go out and get one and it will pay you additional benefits on top of whatever you get from your company.

And it will pay you even just to be out on FMLA.

Like every week, you’re out.

Is that through California?

No, it’s a private insurance company.

So as I evolved with what I was doing, I saw a need here for this type of insurance benefit.

And I ended up going out, I got my insurance license, and I found a company now that I just like sell insurance through, that offers supplemental short-term policies.

So meaning like they pay you out in addition to anything you get from your employer, in addition to anything you get from the state, if you’re disabled or in pregnancy before or after birth.

And they also have, if you’re not in California, something called paid FMLA, where you can get paid up to $500 a week for 11 of your 12 weeks of FMLA.

And it’s completely tax-free, it’s available in every state, except for California, the paid FMLA.

But you have to get it before you’re pregnant.

And so many women come to me when they’re pregnant, and then they’re like, oh, I want to get one of these policies.

I’m like, oh, now you’ve got a pre-existing condition.

And sure, the insurance company will write you a policy, but they’re going to say it’s excluding birth and pregnancy and all that stuff.

Right.

Yeah.

And they’re really inexpensive for women that are like, well, what is that?

I mean, it’s dependent on what your salary, what you make, but like 50 bucks a month up to 100.

Like it’s really affordable to get paid out up to $500 a week of FMLA, in addition to like any disability you may have too.

It’s like.

Right.

Even if no matter what the benefit is, I mean, that’s 50 bucks is enough to order Postmates.

And then that’s one more meal that you don’t have to worry about while you’re worrying about somebody else.

So I just want to say like look into your insurance benefits, because I’ve seen women who their employer didn’t say anything, because in California at least, all employers are required to do is share the paperwork and share the information with you and say, here it is.

And then it’s our job, it is literally us as the pregnant individuals or the planning team or the partners to decipher it.

That is not the responsibility of the employer.

And if you didn’t know of this short term disability plan, I’m going to actually apply for it and blah, blah, blah.

And HR doesn’t tell you, they’ve done their job because they’ve given you the paperwork.

And I’ve seen women who did not file on a policy their employer provided and missed out on thousands of dollars.

So that’s like a big one.

It’s just understanding insurance.

And I know most of us haven’t, when we go to get pregnant, haven’t had a big life event where we’ve probably had to go on disability.

I mean, I have, like when I was in college, I was 19 and I went through, I had Hodgkin’s lymphoma, so I went through cancer and chemotherapy and radiation.

And so I learned the importance of benefits and insurance at 19, right?

And so now I have this deep bench of like, no, these things are really important where if you’ve never had a life-threatening issue, why would you know?

How would you know, right?

Oh my God, I’m so glad that you’re sharing it with the world, like this is, or at least California at this moment, the rest of the world, they kind of are taking care of a little bit better.

Yeah, oh yeah, outside of, yeah, my DMs are full of people in like other countries, like in Canada, we get this and that.

Our sisters all over get amazing benefits, so.

Yeah, yeah.

So what are three steps that anybody can take to maximize their maternity benefits, just right off the bat?

Three steps that everybody can take to maximize our maternity benefits.

I would say first, get your insurance documents and make sure you are like, you know what your policy means, okay?

Get familiar with benefit waiting period, your percent of your benefit payout and your maximum benefit period as well, okay?

So elimination period, percentage, and then your maximum payout period.

Know how to utilize your policy.

Look at your state to make sure your state doesn’t provide additional pay, pay benefits, and then look at your state to see if they offer you anything beyond FMLA.

FMLA is the federal leave program.

It’s like 12 weeks, but some states, like here in California, you can get seven months of protected leave, meaning your employer has to hold your job, keep your pay the same, and keep your benefits going while you’re out and they can’t fire you.

So, you know, there’s other states that have different protections, different time off, and I think just understanding that where you get your money from and how long you’re out generally are not tied together, and you can be out for maybe longer or shorter than for the full amount you can get paid out for and different things.

So, I feel like going and looking at your state would be the next big thing.

So, look at your own insurance, get all the information, check out your state for the leave and wage protection programs.

And then also, last thing too is to document everything with your employer.

Like, I want to say, I want to just hammer home the emphasis on documenting with your employer.

You can fill out their leave of absence forms.

They’re probably going to have these LOA forms for you to fill out, and that’s great.

But still, document it in your own writing.

Even if they use a third party benefits company that manages the leaves, still send a letter to your HR saying, this is the leave I’m out on, this is a time off, these are my dates, this is where I’m getting paid.

Itemize it out for like a fourth grader, because if something goes down, and they try to cut off part of your leave, or they try to pull something, and they try to say they didn’t know that you’re not gonna get that time off, or no, we didn’t agree to that.

But if you have it in writing for a fourth grader, you have rights, and you’re now protected, and you can go to an attorney if you need to, and you feel like you’re discriminated against, which I can’t tell you how many women I see being discriminated against.

And I’m not saying it’s always with malintent.

Sometimes it’s just folks at the companies that have no clue.

And so they just start saying no to things, and when they can’t.

So when it’s documented properly in writing, simply, like fourth grader bullets outlined, don’t write paragraphs, that’s convoluted.

Just simple bullets.

I love a bullet.

Yeah, who does that?

Like a little outline.

I know.

I had a therapist who was like, right, you know, she gave me a journaling prompt, and I was like, okay, you’re the bullets I came up with.

And she was like, yeah.

Therapy and feelings aren’t about bullets, Meredith.

I was like, my life is about bullets.

It’s so much easier.

It has been such a pleasure to talk to you, Diane.

How can people reach you?

How can people get into the programs that you offer?

And what are, what is like the basic program that you offer for folks to?

Yeah, so I have the Maximize Maternity 101, and it’s basically a 101 course here in California currently that will be expanding.

And hopefully, hopefully in the next couple of months here by June, we’ll be out nationwide.

But really just walking through, like I show samples of like employer documents, insurance documents.

This is what to look for in yours.

This is what it is.

This is how to understand.

So if yours says this, this is what you’re gonna get.

I mean, it is step by step, walking women through every single time off and paid benefit that they have access to.

And I give templates and calculators on how to make sure they can submit it to their employer correctly.

And we have live office hours.

So women that are out on their leaves and something weird happens, they have a reason.

There’s not just like a void or a vacuum.

There’s somebody there, me, every other week to ask questions to.

Sometimes our office hours.

You are the HR that I wish that I had at some of these companies.

Yeah, and sometimes our live office hours go on for like two hours because I will answer every single question until everybody feels like, yep, got it, like now I’m gonna go back.

And I’ll just tell them, and like here, cite this code of California legislation here.

Ask this question.

No, they can’t tell you to do that.

Cite this code and just say, hey, this.

Like, it’s not just basic answers.

Like, women need somebody that knows that can give them the resources so they can push back.

Because if we don’t have, information is great, but if we don’t have the vocabulary and the understanding of how to utilize the information, it’s useless.

So that’s what I’m trying to do, is empower women to like, no, here’s the benefit, here’s what it means, here’s the vocabulary you need to push back, so you can make sure you have access to it.

So that’s the program.

I also do private consulting for business owners who own companies, and then obviously corporate consulting for companies who want to do, you know, inclusive policies.

So everybody can find me.

My Instagram handle is probably the easiest.

So I’m at California Maternity Leave, or my website, californiamaternityleave.com, and I think we’re gonna keep it that, even when we go nationwide.

I don’t know, I haven’t really put too much thought in like how we’re gonna change.

I’m sure you’ll still keep those things active though.

Yes.

At least it’ll reroute to where you need to go.

And then the last question I have before you go is, we’ve been talking about corporate benefits that are offered, but do you work with folks who are freelance?

Oh yeah, so that’s my business owners.

Yeah, so anybody who’s freelance here in the state of California, if you’re taxed as an S-corp and you pay yourself some kind of W-2 payroll, you have access to paid benefits from California.

And so many times business owners have no clue.

They think, well, I don’t work for Google or Old Navy or Starbucks, so I’m not going to get anything.

But that’s not true.

So yeah, I work with business owners privately because they don’t have an HR.

So I help them with the paperwork.

We file the papers, the employer papers, the employee paper, everything like that.

So yes, yes, yes, yes.

Oh, you are a godsend.

I’m so grateful to have met you.

And I can’t wait to talk to you a little bit more because we’re going to…

Yes, absolutely.

It was so nice to meet you.

Thank you for having me on.

And, oh, I was going to say, I forgot one thing.

If somebody wanted an insurance quote for like paid…

Yes.

The paid FMLA or a short-term disability policy, they can find me on my other website, which is paidfmla.com.

Because yeah, exactly.

But get it before you’re pregnant.

And then, you can get it too, which I think is amazing.

Thank you so much.

And have a great day.

The Backup Plan is created, produced, and hosted by me, Meredith Kate.

Julian Hagins is my co-producer.

You can find us on social media at backupplanpod.

The best place to get updates is to sign up for our newsletter at backupplanpod.com, where we also post all episodes, show notes and transcripts.

Thank you for listening.