If a company is advertising unlimited PTO as a positive part of their compensation, but intends to give you 10 days in 1.5 years I guess it isn't a bluff...they just think you are stupid. He =outlines how he was told that the expectation was to take 20 days off a year- don't give employees some benchmark unless it is followed. I've definitely worked at companies that publish the average or median taken as a way to guide employees about what the true quantity of "unlimited" is. I agree that most of us understand unlimited PTO a bit better, which is why most of us would never be as honest as he was with his employer. I would definitely counsel anyone in his situation to get whatever PTO approved FIRST, come back for a few days, and then request FMLA straight with HR. Your manager should understand that what you use your "personal" (not "vacation") time off isn't their business. Be cheerfully vague about PTO prior to approval. Before and after any kind of leave, take notes on all conversations with date/time, outlines of subjects and direct quotes. This is actually something all employees (and really managers, but managers already have the company and HR in their corner) should do with any and all one on ones. A manager telling someone they can't approve PTO because they aren't going on a fun vacation but rather staying home with family, and then mis-directing them to take their FMLA before exhausting whatever PTO could have been granted, and then denying them any additional PTO after the FMLA is insane. FMLA is not a Federal Government program to subsidize a private company's PTO expenditures. I would also love to know how this ruins anything anyone. Are fun, vacuousvacations being ruined by people with real problems having a reasonable expectation that unlimited PTO policies would include the sorts of extended/bereavement leaves that used to be offered in separate policies?