I was made redundant two weeks after my wife gave birth to twins. I think they were still in hospital actually. I was going to take paternity leave but if someone gave me the option of two weeks paternity or being made redundant I'll take redundancy any day of the week.

t took 2 weeks at the goverments lovely sum of £103 odd sum a week

Hora you sneaky get, I'd have gotten a major ass kicking of the Mrs if I tried that. Could be classed as pretty major deception, considering the circumstances.

I'd been super-chilled the whole way through from before the labour to during to after. I told her to WTFU and it was only a cat-lick and over in a shortwhile whereas I'd been traumatised, stressed and tired from telling her to push for soo long.

(Some of the above may be patently untrue or a blatant lie)

no cos when my kids were born, it was not a problem , as it seems to be now, son was born 3 days later was back in N.I , what is the point i ask my self often.

I didn't. Wanted to but the loss of the two weeks' money comes out in one month – had I been able to spread it over the tax year it wouldn't have been a problem.

It was a bit tricky as our lad was three months early and the missus still needed looking after for a while after the birth, so you kind of need paternity leave twice – once to look after mum and get used to what's going on, and another more normal one once you get the baby home – but I ended up having to go back to work and let her down somewhat, just so I'd have enough holiday for when he came home from hospital and for the rest of the year. I managed to bag a few days' emergency leave during the 'excitement' but not the paternity leave.

So I think the scheme is fine, bar the cost hit being all in one go. If you're living to your means, it would mean the mortgage not getting paid one month.

Bloody scroungers!

In my day any time off meant we either lost pay or it came out of our holiday allowance.

Not taken any 😥 Trying to arrange locum cover in August is tricky at best of times. When it could have been anytime in a 6 week period even trickier to organise.

Off for birth and day after but back to work after that. Such is life, the pay level means I have just stored up holiday and will use that instead but when he is about 3.5 weeks old ie week after next.

Sleep deprivation is similar to being on call but both together is a bit of a killer!

Still worth it as he is cool.

Has anyone taken any unpaid leave i.e. the 13 weeks unpaid leave that you are entitled to take before the child is 5?
My son is 5 next year and both myself and the wife have taken 2 weeks unpaid leave each this year, the reduced pay has just filtered through to our paypackets this month, so keep an eye on the classifieds for all the stuff I will be selling.

I was made redundant two weeks after my wife gave birth to twins.

Now you see if in that sentence you simply dropped words 'my wife' and replaced them with 'I', there's no way that would ever have happened. Daffy, did you think about bringing a case for discrimination?

I was made redundant a month before my son was born and at the time there were two pregnant women in the offce, niether of whom were even 'put at risk'. This caused a lot of upset to other people who were at risk, myself included, because it seemed grossly unfair that their pregnancy meant they were being treated differently.

As it turned out, being around full time for his first six months of life was the best opportunity I could have ever had, but I sure as hell would not have volunteered for it. I would have taken paternity leave though.

When my first child was born I was unemployed so spent loads of time with her for the first two months before I found a job. When she was about 5 months old she developed some sort of hatred for me and wouldn't come near me for anout 3 months without screaming like a lunatic, which was pretty upsetting.
The second was born three years later and due to financial pressures (only earning £82 a week as an apprentice) I only took the 1 week off allowed by my employer. As such I missed out on the "essential bonding" time afforded to my first child. And yet experienced no such hatred issues.

I just think you should make time for your children wherever and whenever you can, if you can afford to take the time off, great, if you can't then don't beat yourself up about it. In the long run, as long as you put family before work then eventually you'll reap the rewards (even if you can't afford the bike you really want and have to make do with buying second hand 3 year old machines!!)

No-one died wishing they'd spent more time in the office…….