Work and double talk, grr!

[NaterbugsMom]

 You know, i reeeeeeally don't like being told one thing one day, feeling relieved and telling everyone about it, and then that day comes and something totally different is the reality of it all.

Here we go.  The company that I work for is subcontracted by the Dept. of Labor to run one of their training facilities.  There are over 120 of these facilities across the U.S.  Well, the operator company I worked for lost its contract and we got taken over by another operator.  Not a big deal there.  We figured that Management would have the biggest problem and we "line staff" - the ones who actually do the day-to-day training etc - would essentially be ok providing we had all our clearances, trainings and passed our tox screen.  ANYWAY!  We had a big All Staff meeting with this new contractor and were told that the HR dicision would give their benefits info the week of June 8th.  At the end, I privately explained that June 7th was my last day before I went on Family Medical Leave (FMLA) to have my c-section on June 11th.  John* told me that he would make me a deal:  so long as I promised not to go into labor during it, he would let me have the benefits meeting the Friday before I left (meaning today.)  No prob, as I'm actually not due til the 18th, I'm thinking!

So I come into work today and there's a letter on my drawer from our current HR rep.  Upon calling her ASAP as requested, she says that, after speaking with this new company, they had NO CLUE why I was told I would get this info; that they weren't dissemindating it until the week of the 8th as said.  I figured I'd go to them personally anyway and thanked her for the heads-up.

I go right into their room and addressed John.  "I have a problem," I said.  I repeated our previous discussion and that I had heard from one of our current HR reps that that was apparently not the case.  He said I could talk to Nicole* in a minute and all would be figured out. 

Nicole said that I could come in the week after.  Umm, NO lady, I can't!  I told her I'm having a c-section.  (That apparently had no effect on her as I got a queer look that spoke volumes about her lack of parenthood or at least, knowledgability of "non-natural" birth.  So I educated her.) I said, "I can't be in a car for about 6 weeks after."  Blank look.  Blink, blink.  I tried again.

"The seat belt will go right across my incision. I can't be in a car until that all heals up."

Ok, so her solution was, we'll Fed-Ex you a package and you can go over it.  Yeah, cuz I have time to read over complicated HR/benefits info with a breastfeeding newborn, post-partum EVERYTHING to deal with (including the pain of having a newborn around after just losing my ADORED then-14.5 mo old son in February!) and a now-on-summer-break 6 year old son around.  Piece of cake, lady!  *eye roll*  Upon saying a much edited and slightly more PC version of that to her, she says that I can feel free to CALL if I have questions. 

At this point, I was so disgusted I just said thanks and got up and left before my mouth opened and all the unfiltered thoughts spewed out.

Let me explain - it's not that I minded not receiving the information a week ahead of everyone else, as a general rule.  I understand that they might not be sure they were going to offer me my position, or that they were worried i would pass along info early to others or that if i DID pass out info, it would get all mixed up and everyone would have more questions than they normally would have because of confusion.  What I minded was being told by one person that I could, having a weight lifted off my chest thinking I had one less worry on maternity leave, then - come that day - hearing something totally different and finding out that I had more worries than I thought.

Grr.. Maybe I'm just being overly-sensitive.  I dunno anymore.