As holidays come around, the family has upped their questions about when we are having kids and why we haven’t yet. Doesn’t help that my sibling with one other kid just announced her second pregnancy. Definitely happy for her, but don’t feel like I need to explain to the whole family that we are struggling.

My wife is in sales at Mercedes and she has been averaging $200k a year and growing YoY. She loves her job, however she works long days and barely gets time off. We plan on having kids within the next year or two, and it’s highly u likely that she’ll be able to keep her current gig. We want to find a career that allows her to work remote or that at least gives her a better work life balance so that she can see her kids grow up. Should she get certifications to give her a shot at adtech?Too late?

Should I transition to a tech sales job? Thoughts on risk vs reward? I am 34 yo, married with a baby incoming. I work at Google Cloud in solutions engineering (I help develop quantitative business cases with sales teams for customers). My cash base + bonus is $220k (going to ignore equity). I have an MBA from the University of Chicago, not that it matters much in sales. I have always been in a consulting role but I think I can make more in sales. I have a competitive personality and I am bored.

Companies in the area with the best maternity leave?

Question for those who are married or about to be : how did you know he/she was the one? And how long did it take you to realize it?

AITA? If my SO of 1 year wants to get a dog, do I get an opinion? We don’t live together

I often wonder why I did accounting because the services I provide to my clients mean nothing to them. At the wake of my friend's dad tonight, he asked for my help during dealing with his family

Is 2k too big of a gift for a new friend (<4 months)? I went on vacation with my sons and a new friend and her son for a week. I put the hotel and amusement park tickets on my card for simplicity. After the vacation, she asked me to give her an itemized bill and I got busy with work and life and forgot about it for a month. She now has a lot of big home repairs she has to take care of and it's holiday season so I feel ridiculous asking for 2k from a single mom who makes 10% of what I do. (Cont.)

My gf and me call each other everytime we have free time. However lately she seems disinterested in phone time. She never initiates calls anymore and she tells me she wants to hang up in the middle of the day and not right before bedtime. We live a 4 hour drive apart. And I told her this is like living together from a distance, because I put her on the house speakers. What can I do to keep her engaged?

Hello Fishes. 8.5 YOE . Automation Testing. Female with 2 year old baby. Prefer WLB over money.

Following offers in hand :
_VOIS : 22.10 LPA (19 fixed + 3.10 variable)
Nagarro : 25 LPA (23.75 fixed + 1.25 variable)
Intersoft Data Labs (formerly known as VServ) : 26.25 LPA (24.90 fixed + 1.35 variable)

Please suggest which to choose.

Is it normal to pay for monthly OB visits while pregnant? I have BCBS and thought they would be covered 100%?

Misled on Maternity Leave Policy. I found out I only get 4 weeks pay for maternity leave (STD +“sick days”). I will take 12 weeks but wont get paid for 8 weeks. I work for a US, west coast based company in the tech/VC industry. Their website claims to offer “paid parental leave and other progressive benefits for parents”. I didn’t find out until after I was hired their pay was only 8 weeks but since I have been at the company less than 12 months, I don’t qualify for their policy. Is this unfair?

Hi Sharks,
Till last July I was earning 12 LPA, now I switch to a product based with 30 LPA. Where 27 is the base. Monthly I pay 45k tax.
Things that i am doing already is LIC = 40 k , SSA= 50 k (for my kid) and tution fees = 25 K .So altogether withPF other superannuation fund I can show 1.5 Lakhs in 80 C.

Apart from this planning to buy flats or small villa in chennai. I can pay invest more as my most money goes as a saving or buy gold as risk free. Please advice wat else can i do? Kindly

Anyone else find themselves getting extremely stressed at work during pregnancy? It’s like my emotions are just off and I get so stressed so easily. I want to be calm for baby but it’s hard to not get worked up!

Any one please give me some clarity on TCS maternity policy. My wife is 5 months pregnant now and my joining date in tcs is 21- March. I'm I eligible for insurance amount for maternity expenses. If yes how much.

Anyone stuck in an unhappy marriage? How do you deal with loneliness of this profession and complicated family life

My father had a sever case of Covid and he made it out successfully. I’m very grateful for this. Close to a year down the line, I’m finding that he is having severe memory loss issues and can’t remember significant details. Has anyone experienced or is experiencing this? How have y’all dealt with it?

35F divorced with a kid. I think I will never get remarried or in a serious relationship again. Lots of men don't like dating women with children. At my age either the guys are past their prime, divorced/ing and have to provide half their income to their first wife. Many with kids live on the same street as their ex wives so they can be close to their child. I'm not comfortable dating guys like that. On the flip side there are the ones that were never married, which by this age cont

It’s week 5 for me of the breakup and even though I had a full and fun weekend with friends and people I love, I woke up today so so sad because I wanted to text my ex. I just feel overall so defeated and exhausted from sadness and unmotivated at work :(

To those who divorced or called off the engagement, did you take the ring back? And if so, what did you do with it?

How do I ship my mom in law back? Almost ruining our marriage and loosing the affection for my wife and kids already

To do an ERA or not before transfer is the question. My clinic said currently the recommendation is to only do an ERA with multiple transfer fails, but I’ve read about ERA’s for those with recurrent pregnancy loss as well. Anyone go through this experience?

Any insight into STB’s tax group?

Inspired by my first heartbreak. A painful time in my life that I couldn’t make sense of it.

We’re here to support each other, laugh together, heal together, and get back on our feet!

How do you balance FT freelance contracts with ongoing, one-off freelance client work? For me the trickiest part is not knowing when I will be free for meetings with the one-off clients.

Realized my tax withholding has been from NY (company based in nyc) instead of NJ (where I live)… I’m assuming this has to be changed asap with HR? And prob leaving money on the table…

Happy Saturday!
9/17 Check-In: What’s everyone up to today?

I am on my way to my HIIT class.

Anyone here that can give insights into hours and wlb in Deloitte Consulting (finance and performance) in Dubai? Curious to hear honest answer on how much work is expected there.

What is the hike percentage expected with almost always feedback with promotion to senior consultant and without promotion and the bonus percentage tech consulting service line

Please help and guide ... It's urgent

Do you all feel that the Health Insurance choice is actually all the same? The coverage is absolutely copy and paste for Bronze to Platinum and the deductible/copay is very similar.
I just don’t understand why we have the illusion of “choice” if the offer is the same and it is really bad (in our case).
Going from $61 per paycheck for 2.5k deductible 75% copay to $500+ per paycheck with 500 deductible 85% copay.
Other firms have better health insurance?

If the healthcare industry is so messed up, why hasn’t there been any successful healthcare startups? Seems like there is so much opportunity for improvement here, but there must be a reason no one is capitalizing on it. What are the barriers?

Considering pivoting into a local MM IB. As my title suggests, my technical skills aren’t as honed as one who has focused on the analysis route. How much of being an Analyst at a smaller IB is technical skill heavy coming into the role? I hold my 7, 66, 24, and am not worried about getting the 79. Any input for how realistic this is? When looking at one particular firm’s career page it doesn’t mention technical skills or modeling once, which led me to believe it may be less important than soft.

What do you think is the most psychologically taxing part of being in the military? I think it's that you're taught to suppress yourself.

Anyone else on the bench now?

Any updates on yemalur office, when will it open?

Fresh embryo transfer. Got my period yesterday, and my pregnancy test in the clinic is tomorrow... so frustrated after all the investment... I had two embryos frozen so hopefully next time it happens... hope everyone gets what they want.

IUI, is it worth it or skip and go straight to IVF?

Ok, so how bad are the side effects from IVF stim injections and the aftermath from retrieval? Thinking to use some sick or vacation days for the worst times but not sure how many and when.

Hi! Have any here gone the natural cycle IVF route? What was your experience like? Did you have success in growing your family this way? Would you recommend it to others?

Anyone experience heartburn after retrieval? This is my third and haven’t had acidity before. Doctor warned about pain, nausea etc but no guidance around heart burn which gets real bad when I sleep.

We recently started the fertilization process with frozen eggs. I had 11 frozen and all survived the thaw but only 3 turned into embryos. We are waiting to see how many get to the blast state. Does any one know where I can find statistics on what the typical attrition / success rates are?

Best age to freeze my eggs? I’m 30. Is it too early?

@EYfishes what are the best resources to get details on EY fertility benefits and process?

Okay, so I have pretty bad cystic acne, clogged pores and enlarged pores. I’ve been using curology and a mild dermatologist recommended soap. I have seen some improvement, however I was curious if anyone was struggling with it and has tried the “Flo Vitamin gummy’s “ on top of my fertility struggle this really has kinda killed my confidence. I know it’s not specifically fertility related but Was hoping to get some feedback on similar situations

Travel and TTC combo haven’t worked. After 6 months, the only offer I got included 4 weeks paid and FLMA only after 1 year. So 1) go and risk laughable benefits or 2) stay but risk TTC. So shitty 😭

Anyone successfully take STD or extended long term disability for final IVF procedure? I’d like to take 6 months, Destress before hand then go into extraction. Docs say if this doesn’t work they recommend I move onto other options so I want to give it a fair shot. My clinic will fill out fMLA / medical forms but not sure who ultimately decides the duration. Should I also consider other mental health leave alternatives? Thank you!

For those who have researched these things at length / spoken to doctors: if I’ve had children in the past and have had a chemical pregnancy recently, is there any point to sending my husband for a sperm analysis? E.g., his swimmers hypothetically must be at least kind of working?

What are some acne treatments to use when TTC or pregnant?

Any sucessful ivf experience with DOR ?

Husband and I have been TTC for almost a year. His semen analysis came back all normal with the exception of morphology at 1% (Kruger Strict criteria). Anyone have insights into morphology and it’s impacts on fertility? From what I’ve read and after talking to our fertility specialist morphology seems subjective.

Had a miscarriage.. it’s my 1st baby and we didn’t find out until 12 weeks (via ultrasound) that the baby passed away at 9 weeks and had to get a dnc. My body is still recovering.. Just want some hope or I guess stories of success after having a miscarriage. I do have pcos so it’s harder for me to get pregnant.. but it still happened. Anyone have any thoughts or advice? Does it get better..?

What are tips/recommendations for a FET (frozen embryo transfer)? Any tests that you recommend should be performed? Any “home remedies” that should be applied? Some do/don’ts?

I did my second natural cycle IUI today and the two week wait commences. If it doesn't work, we will be going to IVF. Thankful for remote work as it allowed me to have privacy over my schedule.

When is the progesterone oil shot suppose to cause pain? I injected my wife 15 min ago in the upper outer quadrant and she feels fine.

Any advice on how to improve embryo growth drop off rate? Just finished our second retrieval and I’m frustrated by how many dont make it to blastocysts. We have good fertilization rate through ICSI. Is it normal for about 25% of fertilized eggs to make it to day 6/7? Husband has low count & motility and i have endo, both 33