10. Explore the French Legal System

There's a pecking order when it comes to bragging about the length of your maternity leave. When I tell Americans I got 16 weeks, they hold back tears, but when I tell Scandinavians, they hold back laughter. Either way, I was excited for maternity leave — and it was great! I highly recommend it as a paid vacation, save for the postpartum depression, aching body, unrelenting guilt, and sleep deprivation-induced hallucinations.

But shortly after, I got a letter stating that I didn't actually qualify for paid maternity leave and now owed the French government €8300 for my little vacation. The reason: a bunch of tedious technicalities due to the date I acquired my social security number, blah blah blah. I just fixated on the amount owed and thought, "I guess I'm entering my Fantine era."

When the boot of French bureaucracy is on your neck, some people, like me, react by going numb and disowning this cruel world. But others, like my husband Dustin, take it as a challenge to bring down the Texas hammer.

There was a line in the letter that said we could refute this claim by raising a case at the Tribunal de Paris, which for us, was basically small claims court. This is such an inconvenient option that few people have the patience or time to do it. But Dustin always has the time. (Plus €8k is a lot of money.)

When our court date finally rolled around, two years had passed and, in that time, I had given birth to another whole ass baby. This is another French bureaucracy tactic: drag things out as long as possible in the hope that you give up. It works on me all the time, but again, Dustin is fueled by vengeance. In fact, he was very excited to act as my lawyer because, well, we couldn't afford a lawyer.

Did you know in the courtroom, French lawyers all wear black Judge Judy robes? This only added to the drama once we were at the Tribunal. We were in a room with 20 other people presenting their cases, each toting their own fancy lawyer. I was scared shitless. Dustin was wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase, and I was wearing my best Monoprix business attire, plus a double padded breastfeeding bra to stop any leaking.

When our time came, we stood before the judge, who read aloud our case details.