I Support My Husband’s Plan to Get Plastic Surgery. But the Way He Plans to Pay for It Is Unacceptable.

Good Job is Slate’s advice column on work. Have a workplace problem big or small? Send it to Laura Helmuth and Doree Shafrir here. (It’s anonymous!)

My husband is balding like many guys in their 30s. He’s never had any major appearance hangups—weight, clothes, working out, he’s all fine if it comes and goes. But the hair is a big deal to him. He loves his hair, and with it thinning, he feels like he suddenly looks in the mirror and sees his deadbeat dad. For the past few years he’s been doing prescription treatment. But this year he decided on a hair transplant. We make OK money but no frills, and divide our budget into shared expenses, savings, and personal fun money every month. He’s been strict with saving his fun money, and my gift for his birthday this year was a chunk of my fun money towards this procedure too.

But it’s going slower than he wants, especially because costs are rising faster than expected. He floated taking a side gig to get to his savings goal more quickly. I feel like a bad spouse but I don’t want him to. We’re parenting twin toddlers, and we both work full time, so daily life is a chaotic balancing act. I know there are lots of hyper-competent people out there, but if I have to manage more of our kids or household solo while he’s at a second job, we might drown.

How do I balance helping my husband solve this thing that’s very important to him with the practicalities of our household? I want to talk with him about getting it done overseas as a potential cost saving, too, but he’s convinced he’ll end up in a place where he can’t speak the language with a botched procedure.

Dear Hair Raising Problem,

As a general matter, I don’t think there’s any point in telling people they shouldn’t be upset about losing their hair, because it can be really destabilizing and upsetting. So I think it’s admirable that you’ve been so supportive of his desire to get a hair transplant. But I agree that his taking on a second job to fund the transplant when you have twin toddlers is a terrible idea. It would put such an undue burden on you, and, I fear, also cause you to resent him. This feels like a non-starter to me.

If he’s not willing to wait until you have enough money saved up, I would encourage him to look into CareCredit or a similar program, which are financing options specifically for cosmetic procedures. Also, some plastic surgery and hair transplant doctors have their own financing programs—if he has identified the doctor he’d like to use, it’s worth asking about any financing options they might have in their own office. Finally, I know he doesn’t want to go abroad for the procedure, but what about shopping around in a different state? If you live in a high cost-of-living state like California or New York, maybe it’s worth seeing what a doctor in Ohio would charge.

And just one more thing. I hope if you ever want a cosmetic procedure done, that your husband is just as supportive of you as you have been of him. It’s only fair, after all.

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I work in an office of about 150 people. I have lipedema, although I never breathe a word about it at work . It’s stigmatized and doctors tend to have weird fat shaming things to say about it, and my company has a big fitness/wellness culture.

This winter during our slow season I’m going to take several weeks off for liposuction treatment and recovery. I’m hoping this will improve my comfort and mobility but it’s not a magic bullet. Because I’m a size six on top and always wear loose skirts or pants, my coworkers may not notice any difference at all. I’d prefer not to discuss it at work, but I don’t know how to frame this “vacation.” I will have bruising, compression garments, and extra sensitivity to jostling or bumping. I might need short-term accommodations on my return. Even if I get a doctor’s note, it will be a note from a cosmetic practice, because that’s where this work is done.

Two questions: how do I frame this with our (gossipy, mediocre) HR team? And how do I frame it with my boss and coworkers? I have plenty of PTO, it’s more the other parts that are leaving me worried.

I’m sorry that you feel worried about how your workplace will react to your surgery, and also that you seem to work at a pretty fatphobic company. So I totally understand why you feel hesitant about being completely forthcoming about your upcoming procedure. I think you can proceed on a need-to-know basis here. You can let your manager and HR department know that you are having a necessary medical procedure done this winter, and when you return, you will need certain accommodations. Legally, you are not required to give them your diagnosis or the details of your surgery or treatment—you only need to tell them about your condition if you are asking for reasonable accommodations. How I’m parsing this distinction is that you don’t need to tell them that you have lipedema, but if you are asking for accommodations, you should tell them that you are having a procedure that may make movement uncomfortable for up to a certain amount of time. I would present this as matter-of-factly as you can, and if you need a doctor’s note, it can outline what accommodations you need—not discuss your diagnosis. Good luck with the surgery!

I’ve had the same cleaning lady, “Billie,” for a few years now. She’s always done a great job, and we’ve never had any problems before. Over the years a lot of my friends have also hired her, some on my recommendation. Yesterday, my good friend “Karla” told me that some of her codeine pills went missing after Billie came to clean. Karla had a prescription for them after some minor dental surgery two weeks ago, and she had 25 pills in the bottle. Karla always makes a big deal about being hardcore when it comes to pain, so she hadn’t even taken any of the pills yet, just Tylenol, but she says she did count them when she first got the bottle. On Friday morning, Karla was going through her prescriptions and she noticed the bottle was almost empty. There were only 10 pills left.