I found myself in a strange position today. First, let me back up. During our first IVF cycle, I pretty much told anyone that would listen about every follicle, shot and the overall state of my uterus. I was so excited about the whole thing and felt like I needed to give play by play reports.
"Ladies and Gentlemen! Welcome to WIVF! We're currently in Suzanne's uterus and at the moment, we see 12... No, wait! 13, yes! 13 growing follicles. Oh no! Her butt is protesting against the last progesterone shot. It's not a pretty site, folks"
So, with this next FET cycle, I decided I might need to tone it down a bit. Ya think?!
That brings me to today. My department manager sent out an email asking for everyone's availability because she wants to plan an outing for the leadership team. Apparently, this is a summertime tradition and I'm the rookie. She specifically mentions leaving the afternoon of 8/14, spending the night and coming back on 8/15.
Crap. One quick check in my mental rolodex and the 15th is my estimated transfer date.
I send an email back to her, trying to adhere to my "zip it" rule.
"I have tentatively scheduled a PTO day on the 15th for a minor medical procedure".
There, that's cryptic enough, right? That should get her off my back for sure!
Nope. She responds with more questions. "When will you know if you need that day off?".
Shit. I sat there for a good 10 minutes, trying to think of some other witty and generic response.
Finally, I decided to just let her know what was going on. Luckily, she knew about the ectopic and the resulting surgery in October. Because, I was like, out of work for 6 weeks. So, she kind of had to know because it would've been pretty obvious with the empty desk and all.
I didn't think it would be an awkward conversation but it kinda was. I'm not sure if it was just me though. I literally just got promoted to the Unit Manager position 2 weeks ago so part of me was paranoid - like me getting pregnant would screw up the entire regional management team? Uh, not really.
So, hopefully I haven't sabotaged my entire professional career because I divulged my desire to procreate.
She was still waiting on the other managers' responses so I might get lucky and she'll have to re-schedule. If not, I think I can still go down the day of the 14th and then just drive back early evening.
But, this brings me to another dilemma. I neglected to mention this "outing" is mostly just hanging out in her lake house, driving around on her boat and oh yeah... drinking. Let me preface this by saying that I am known to drink occasionally. OK, I went to West Virginia University. Enough said.
If I only go down for the day, I can play the "I'm driving" card and probably get away with it. If she re-schedules and I have to spend the night, I'm screwed. I could just say "Female problems". That always tends to shut people up. Anyone have any other really, really good excuses for not drinking?
5 comments:
good post, I know how hard it is to balance work/art. I i I I
I hated explaining my absences with out just telling the whole stupid story. It's hard to keep it short and sweet sometimes.
Could you fib and say you're on a medication (antibiotics come to mind) and can't drink because of the interaction if anyone notices your abstaining? Another option would be to make/bring your own drink and just pretend. I've faked it many times in front of friends and family.
Good luck!
Hi there....I've used the antibiotics excuse too and tend to just be vague generally. I'm not too sure I've fooled anyone though, but at least it gets you out of any other embarrassing explanations.
I'm sorry to hear about your work issues....I've had some similar problems and I hate that my personal life is reluctantly creeping into work. One of my managers knows the full story (very awkward conversation!) and with a couple of others I've used the term "ongoing medical issues", like I'm sure they can't guess if they thought about it hard enough. It sucks though, the worst thing being that you can only hazard a guess at when a retrieval or transfer will happen, and its subject to change. Unsurprisingly, this doesn't fit in well with a full time job and deadlines! Good luck with your juggling! (not to mention good luck with the cycle)
You are too funny. People at my office don't realize ask about absences, probably because they're all lawyers and are skittish about violating employment laws. I'd say, tell them only as much as you want. It's none of their business.
I hope it all works out and the date doesn't conflict. I used to use antibiotics as my stand-by excuse for not drinking.
Although we only told a few people about IVF#1, we only told those that had to know due to work conflicts about #2.
You are too funny!I just came across your blog - I love it!
I would get out of drinking by drinking... before I came out of the closet about my IF I would drink sprite or soda and say it had liquor in it if anyone asked.
Beer only is a bit harder...I would hold the bottle and pour it out when no one was looking, then just continue to hold an empty bottle.
Good Luck!
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