By Naomi Bromberg Bar-Yam, PhD
September is NICU Awareness Month—a time to honor and support families navigating the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and to spotlight how public policy can make a difference. Establishing and sustaining milk supply, providing skin-to-skin contact, and building a feeding relationship all rely on time, presence, and emotional space. Yet for many parents, parental leave runs out before their child ever comes home.
Across the country, states are finding different ways to make paid NICU leave happen. Currently, ten states, including Massachusetts, plus D.C., have mandatory Paid Family and Medical Leave (PFML) programs, and an additional four states are set to implement PFML programs by 2026. Nine states have voluntary programs.[1] The laws have varying durations and funding approaches, but leave time often falls into three categories—parental leave, family caregiving, and personal medical leave, which can sometimes be combined.
Under Massachusetts PFML, parents may take:
- Up to 20 weeks of paid medical leave for their own serious health condition, which can include pregnancy complications, childbirth recovery, and postpartum medical needs;
- Up to 12 weeks of paid family leave to care for a family member with a serious health condition, including a newborn in the NICU;
- Up to 12 weeks of paid family leave in the first year to bond with a new child, adoption, or foster placement.
These can be combined, up to a total of 26 weeks in a benefit year.[2] This means time spent in the NICU can be covered as family leave to care for a seriously ill family member, without cutting into bonding leave after discharge. Unfortunately, many families don’t realize this. As a result, they may take less time than the law allows during a NICU stay.
Colorado’s NICU-Specific Model
In contrast, Colorado recently became the first state to pass a law explicitly naming NICU care as its own category of paid family leave. Beginning in 2026, Senate Bill 25-144 will provide:
- 12 weeks of paid leave specifically for parents of a baby in the NICU,
- In addition to the 12 weeks of standard paid parental leave available to all covered employees.
This explicit language leaves no doubt that NICU time is caregiving time.
While Massachusetts law offers enough total weeks of leave to cover childbirth recovery, NICU care, and bonding, Colorado’s approach offers clarity and visibility that could help families, and HR professionals, understand their rights more easily. It’s a model to consider.
Why This Matters for Breastfeeding
When a baby is in the NICU, feeding often involves pumping, paced bottle feeding of expressed milk, or tube feeding. But proximity still matters. Frequent contact and participation in care support milk production, bonding, and parental confidence.
No parent should have to choose between being at their baby’s bedside during hospitalization or saving their leave for when the baby comes home. Babies in the NICU need their parents present, and parents need to focus on navigating this intense environment—emotionally, physically, and logistically—without worrying about lost income or depleted leave.
What Advocates Can Do in Massachusetts
- Learn the Details to Guide Families
As lactation support providers, we are also advocates. Understanding the specifics of Massachusetts PFML—and how it applies to NICU situations—allows us to help clients and patients identify the right type(s) of leave, gather documentation, and navigate the application process. We can make the difference between a family preserving their bonding leave or losing it before the baby even comes home. - Educate Parents and Providers
Ensure families understand how PFML can be leveraged—medical leave, NICU-care leave, then bonding—to maximize support during hospitalization and post-discharge - Advocate for Clarity
Push the Department of Family and Medical Leave to include explicit examples around NICU leave in materials for providers and HR personnel. Use Colorado’s NICU-specific law as a model for this discussion. - Support Policy Innovation
Encourage state-level policy updates to add NICU-specific language to PFML regulations, ensuring that families and employers clearly understand the protections that already exist.
NICU Awareness Month reminds us that while Massachusetts families already have the potential for extended leave during and after a NICU stay, policy clarity is essential. Colorado’s explicit NICU provision is one way to achieve this. When families know their rights and can take the time they need, babies benefit, breastfeeding thrives, and the path home from the NICU becomes a little smoother.
[1] https://bipartisanpolicy.org/explainer/state-paid-family-leave-laws-across-the-u-s/
[2] https://www.mass.gov/info-details/types-of-paid-family-and-medical-leave
Naomi Bromberg Bar-Yam, PhD, has been working in maternal and child health for 35 years as an educator, researcher, advocate, and writer. In addition to serving on the board of Massachusetts Breastfeeding Coalition, she is past president of the Human Milk Banking Association of North America (HMBANA) and is the founding director emerita of Mothers’ Milk Bank Northeast, which provides safe donor milk to hospitals and families throughout the northeastern US. Learn more about her on her LactSpeak profile.
Comments are closed