I, a childless woman who does not plan to have kids, am jealous of the parental leave parents get to take from work from choosing to have a child (a big life event). I 100% understand that they are working in a different way by taking care of the baby and being deliriously worn out in the process, but it makes me sort of jealous that unless I have a kid there is no life event that I can take ~3 months away from work to focus on and enjoy, plus have my hours prorated and a job to come back to.

I’m sorry but this is stupid/self-centered. If you want to whine about the need for sabbaticals then do that but dont make this about how firms very much necessarily need to accomodate families. We are talking about keeping another human being alive versus someone who just wants a paid vacation.. Not a parent fwiw.

I don’t have children (would like to and I may adopt) and I generally agree. I don’t feel jealousy because almost anyone can become a parent if they choose to (even if not biologically). I think I only feel jealous of things categorically unavailable to me.

That said, the prevailing culture is set up to privilege people who choose to marry and have children. It’s not just law firms. I don’t know that there is any way to change that other than through long term cultural shifts. There are many ways childless folks can contribute to the world, many that are labor intensive (e.g. animal rescue, volunteering with refugees, caring for older relatives) but don’t qualify for automatic paid leave. That is unfair. It would be good to have “major life event” leave that mirrors parental leave. I don’t think of sabbaticals in the same way. To be equivalent to parental leave, it has to be more than just vacation/R&R time.

I’ll let you have a 3 month sabbatical if every day for the next 12 years you have to spend hours of every workday parenting, potty training, trying to find ways to sit down for dinner at 6 pm, researching schools, researching childcare, taking kids to medical appointments, dealing with health crises that aren’t your own.

You can ask for a 3 month sabbatical program, but don’t compare or tie it to parental leave.

I hear you. The short term and long term disability is also a scam. It’s so unfair that because you don’t get into a life altering accident that keeps you from work 3-6 months you don’t get to take advantage of this either.

FYI- some may not get the irony of my post.

The premise that having a kid is the only acceptable leave is flawed. OP presumably has parents and close family - of any of them are seriously injured or ill OP can take FMLA leave to care for them and have a job to come back to. OP could also suffer a major illness or injury and take disability leave to recover and have a job to come back to. Obviously nobody plans to take FMLA or disability leave (you hope you never need it), but it is analogous to parental leave in that you have a job to come back to, nobody faults you for taking it, and your leave is occupied attending to important needs (not a vacation), but FMLA and disability leave doesn't require having kids.

Or, perhaps, we should stop thinking of maternity leave as some sort of sabbatical and view it as the medical leave it is. Go have major surgery that involves your abdomen being sliced in half or your vagina torn into pieces and take some FMLA time if you want your glorious time “off.” Just remember though, you don’t get to sleep, like at all, while recovering.

I’m all for everyone having work life balance and the ability to take vacations, but this comparison is absurd.

Contrary to what society may believe, children are a CHOICE you make for selfish reasons (to experience the joy of parenting, carry on the family legacy, backup retirement plan, so you don’t die alone, whatever). However, bereavement leave, medical leave (includes mental health leaves), etc are NOT choices.

This post isn’t about trying to cancel maternity leave as much as it’s about why we reward one choice with paid leave but provide minimal accommodations for life events outside of our control.

This is the big law bowl. We make lots of money. And if you’re not going to have kids, you have so much more time, space, flexibility, and money to take time off. What’s stopping you from asking for or taking a sabbatical or some time away?

It is admittedly harder for associates, but as a partner, I don’t see how you couldn’t just plan for this. But even as an associate, especially if the leave is unpaid, you might be surprised to find that it is possible. Especially in this market, firms would likely rather give you some time off than have to hire someone new. And maybe you don’t get a bonus for that year, but again your choice to not have children has the perks of not having a significant financial burden so one year’s missed bonus is not a big deal.

I say give it a try. (And please report back, I’d love to know how it goes.)

I think one point that is not fully appreciated here is that most people’s career’s likely won’t be negatively impacted by take a parental leave. Sabbaticals are uncommon and it’s hard for me to think that someone won’t think of the time the associate took a sabbatical because they “needed a break” when partnership talks come up. I’m not saying people should have less mat/pat leave (I think this leave is crucial and frankly too short). I’m just saying that at least from my perspective, mat/pat leave is the only leave that’s actually acceptable (obviously short term medical/bereavement leaves are, too) and won’t (at least on paper) negatively impact your career.

This is, of course, not to say that having children will not make your career more complicated

Damn, can we all agree that the work culture is what is messed up and that everyone should have more time off? That’s what OP said and I can’t find anything wrong with that sentiment. And I say that as a senior associate who is currently on the second of two parental leaves. As the birthing parent, I need the time to physically recover, bond, etc, but that doesn’t mean that taking time off for other things isn’t equally valid!! We should all be working less, period.

You can also go on disability if you decide to have a medical procedure that takes weeks to recover from. I say go for it!

Can we push for parental leave for adopting pets? Please? I want a dog but i am afraid I wouldn’t have enough time to train, feed, walk and everything that comes with adopting a pet!

I think what we are really trying to get at is work-life balance and how much work do our employers really need so that everyone, regardless of choice, can actually be a human.

The FMLA does not just apply to parental leave. If you have a family medical situation that is not childbirth but requires a comparable amount of time and attention, you can get leave. You can get leave for your own medical condition or a non-child family member’s. It’s equal. No one, parents or no, gets extended time off to just enjoy themselves.

I love covering for colleagues who take time away for voluntary domestic indulgences. It builds my experience, it shows the boss they don't really need my colleague, and it puts me in pole position in the next restructuring - especially if it happens whilst they are away. And with sex equality, men also get an equal crack at damaging their career! ;)

Seriously, though: I believe the average household has 2.4 children so if child-free employees commit to not having any children, and sign a waiver, could we have circa 18 months off on full pay, please? Specifically, could I have 18 months off for skiing? Personally, I derive immense spiritual satisfaction from “being at one with the mountains” when I go skiing. I trust that no one will deign to denigrate what I deem valuable in my own life, and seek to elevate over their breeding preferences? Why, therefore, should putative parents, whether birth or adoptive, be awarded, say, 26 weeks’ free salary, and the same be denied to me if I wish to spend a season (or three) improving my off piste technique?

Financially, all these giveaways are effectively paid for by the child-free colleagues of those disappearing off to take a subsidised holiday to bond with their newly-spawned hobby. Having children is a normal thing to and doesn't require having loads of time off to get used to the new arrival: this is simply a gimmick to reward certain employees at the expense of others. Also, the work left behind while the shirkers disappear to drop sprogs must be covered by colleagues - do they get an extra 26 weeks too, or do they just have to work harder? We all know the answer.

There is no benefit to child-free employees when their breeding colleagues are given up to a year off work, at firms’ expense. Those of us who have chosen not to have children (inter alia because they're noisy and expensive) are subsidising colleagues who have decided to indulge their basest reproductive urges on an already-overpopulated planet. Please don't demean critics' intelligence by attempting to portray child-rearing as anything other than self-interested and self-indulgent. It’s not. Good luck to those who choose that path - I genuinely wish them well - but have no desire to subsidise them from my salary.

To be clear, if people want to spawn umpteen children, good luck to them - genuinely. There is however no objective benefit to the rest of us. I am not, nor would I ever seek, to denigrate people's emotional investment in their offspring. Rather, I am merely highlighting the incongruity between arbitrarily assigning value to certain extracurricular activities over others, and rewarding them at the expense of colleagues who have chosen to be child-free (and also those who through infertility have had that choice forced upon them). For, of course, there are limited profits, and they can only be invested into one of, e.g. training, recruiting, marketing, maternity/paternity leave, or salaries. It genuinely is a zero sum game: money paid to breeders is money which cannot go elsewhere. My posited skiing/child-rearing dichotomy is genuine (if slightly facetious). There is a conflict of interest when firms arbitrarily choose to reward certain groups of people with discretionary benefits and not others.

For the avoidance of doubt, I accept that in some firms, there maybe a business case to attract people who wish to downgrade their hours, and that since prospective parents are significant target audience, it may be worth throwing money at them. Please don’t pretend to the rest of us however that this is anything less than a recruiting and retention exercise at the expense of those of us who are happily child-free. Thank you.

It’s definitely not as “acceptable” but particularly if you’ve been at your firm a while and are well-liked there, I do see people negotiate sabbaticals where they take ~3-6 months (unpaid) to travel etc. even when no kids involved - you’d say you need to combat burnout etc. You may have more leverage than you think with the hot market for most biglaw associates right now. May push you back a bit for partnership if you’re senior (same way an extended parental leave may).

Honestly, the job has me readier to start TTC than I thought I would be at the moment. The prospect of extended leave (obviously combined with a wanted child, just a bit sooner than we’d been planning) is seriously factoring into our calculus.

Working is way easier than caring for a child. Stupid post. It's not a vacation.

It sounds like you want paid sabbaticals. Why can’t we as associates start requesting those as part of the benefits package? Maternity leave most certainly is not a sabbatical, so this would be something categorically different but potentially helpful with burnout.

Totally agree. Employers should give us non-parents some equivalent perk: extra paid time off or cash equivalent.

This thread blew up, but I want to say I know of multiple biglaw attorneys who have asked for and received sabbaticals. No official program which is a shame but it is something you can ask for.

Don't know where you work, but many firms sign-off on mental health breaks. They're just not advertised as a "benefit". A number of my colleagues (and those at other firms) have gone off for periods ranging from a month to 6 months. I think the length of the breaks are individually determined.

Some firms do have formal unlimited vacation time policies and others have disability policies that you could make use of for the time off.

Some firms even allow for a rollover of vacation time, allowing for up to 8 weeks of vacation time.

If you want a break, take it. Don't let your envy cause you strife.