I had a very similar situation a year ago. My mom was diagnosed with colon cancer in October 2020, had surgery then, and then went through chemo December - February. I moved from CA to FL to take care of her during the time, and it was extremely tough.
I tried to manage my work while going through it, and negotiated with my manager that I'd be working roughly 50% of my time with the possibility for unexpected days off (my mom had several hospitalizations for transfusions which were unplanned/unexepcted). It wore me out tremendously emotionally, and at the end of it I got a poor performance review for that time period.
I strongly regret not taking "family leave," which if you're in tech your company should offer. If I had taken it, I would have maintained good performance standing in my company as they default you to it if there's insufficient data. Instead, even though my manager was on board with giving me a good performance review, the "bar raisers" decided I hadn't done enough work in that time, and it had knock-on effects on my burnout, because on top of getting back to work normally post-chemo while already being exhausted, I now also had to work extra hard to get out of a bad performance situation.
Additionally, while I did get a good bit of work done during that time, if I had had the time completely free to take care of my mom I would have done a better job taking care of her, and would have had more time to also do self-care, which is extremely important when going through such a difficult time and watching someone you love suffer.
I really wish you the best, I completely understand your situation and you can reach out to me at ryan @ mcafeeryan [dot] com if you want to chat about any of it. It's going to be hard, it's going to suck, and you will get through it.
Yeah honestly it's a bit wild to me that this is a controversial take, and the proposals to "solve" this problem have largely been to cut people off from benefits.
I have a pretty unpopular take on this, being married to someone with severe pet allergies. That take is, dogs (and cats) have no place on an airplane, and responsible adults shouldn't get pets that they can't find sitters for or board while they are away.
Planes are enclosed-air spaces, and the allergens from your dog make anyone with allergies miserable for the entire duration of the flight. Every single time we end up on a plane with a dog (even the "hypoallergenic" ones), my wife ends up sick. Not to mention the fact that there are plenty of people with severe phobias of dogs, and that the animals themselves tend to be extremely uncomfortable on flights. That last factor has actually led to a number of innocent people sitting next to folks with dogs getting bit, etc on planes.
Actual service animals do still belong, because they provide an actual service, are extremely well-trained, and are worth the allergen/phobia tradeoff because folks who need them literally need them.
The amount of entitlement that pet owners have to impose the downsides of their pets on others boggles my mind sometimes.
I have a pretty unpopular take on this, being married to someone with severe pet allergies. That take is, dogs (and cats) have no place on an airplane, and responsible adults shouldn't get pets that they can't find sitters for or board while they are away.
Planes are enclosed-air spaces, and the allergens from your dog make anyone with allergies miserable for the entire duration of the flight. Every single time we end up on a plane with a dog (even the "hypoallergenic" ones), my wife ends up sick. Not to mention the fact that there are plenty of people with severe phobias of dogs, and that the animals themselves tend to be extremely uncomfortable on flights. That last factor has actually led to a number of innocent people sitting next to folks with dogs getting bit, etc on planes.
Actual service animals do still belong, because they provide an actual service, are extremely well-trained, and are worth the allergen/phobia tradeoff because folks who need them literally need them.
I tried to manage my work while going through it, and negotiated with my manager that I'd be working roughly 50% of my time with the possibility for unexpected days off (my mom had several hospitalizations for transfusions which were unplanned/unexepcted). It wore me out tremendously emotionally, and at the end of it I got a poor performance review for that time period.
I strongly regret not taking "family leave," which if you're in tech your company should offer. If I had taken it, I would have maintained good performance standing in my company as they default you to it if there's insufficient data. Instead, even though my manager was on board with giving me a good performance review, the "bar raisers" decided I hadn't done enough work in that time, and it had knock-on effects on my burnout, because on top of getting back to work normally post-chemo while already being exhausted, I now also had to work extra hard to get out of a bad performance situation.
Additionally, while I did get a good bit of work done during that time, if I had had the time completely free to take care of my mom I would have done a better job taking care of her, and would have had more time to also do self-care, which is extremely important when going through such a difficult time and watching someone you love suffer.
I really wish you the best, I completely understand your situation and you can reach out to me at ryan @ mcafeeryan [dot] com if you want to chat about any of it. It's going to be hard, it's going to suck, and you will get through it.