I have been out on maternity leave for 5 months. My company gives us 7 months of unpaid, job-protected leave. I already know I won’t be ready to return to work, and financially I don’t need to. I have no childcare plans (aside from me staying home) and daycares in my area are really bad. We’re probably going to be moving out of state in the next 2 or 3 years but it’s not a definite plan yet. And I intend to have another baby in the next 2 years also. So my future is very uncertain.

My issue is, my job is great, it’s a local government job, it’s decent pay and extremely stable. I like my co workers. I have the option to request and extended leave of absence for no maximum amount of time. They’d hold a similar position but not necessarily in the same department. I really want to request to take 2 more years off, however as you can see idk if I’ll be living here or if I’d be having another baby around that time. So it’s very likely that I won’t go back after all that time.

I have to put in the request to extend my leave very soon bc it takes a while to get approved. I’m scared to ask our division director- she used to be my direct supervisor and I’ve always thought she had something against me. For example, my intermediary supervisor gave me a sort of promotion a few years ago but this person denied it. She has a lot of pull as she’s the director of our whole region. I’m just scared to ask her because of that and also because I might not return and I don’t want to burn bridges because when I am ready to return to work (in 10 years maybe) I’d like to work for this same agency, in a different county.

Does anyone have any advice for me? Sorry this is confusing.