I know you folks in Europe and elsewhere in the world probably take this sort of thing for granted, but it is really unusual here in the US. When our daughter is born next month, I will be entitled to 12 weeks of paid leave, which my boss (great guy, btw) has encouraged me to take fully.

My concern is that I have projects, and twelve weeks is enough time that they would probably die on the vine, even if/when I hand them off to someone else.

It's stressful, and I need a way to deal with it.