It takes so little effort to be a decent boss. A tiny modicum of empathy and a baseline level of common sense — that’s really it! Yet so many bosses do their absolute best to be the complete opposite.
For one worker on Reddit, her boss’s actions are truly baffling in their insensitivity, to an extent that might even be a violation of employment law.
The pregnant worker quit on the spot when her boss refused to make basic accommodations for her.
Working even the simplest job while pregnant can be a real challenge, but when your work requires you to be on your feet every day like this mom-to-be, it can be downright untenable.
But this worker was sure that her requests for basic accommodations during her pregnancy would be no big deal, “after nearly two years of being flexible covering shifts, switching shifts and changing schedules numerous times at the whim of my manager.”
She’s scratched the boss’ back, so surely the boss will be willing to scratch hers, right? Absolutely not, as it turns out.
“I worked in a restaurant attached to a bar,” she explained in her Reddit postwhere there is “lots of gambling, lots of drunk people and great customers, and even more cigarette smoke.”
Her boss had already blabbed about her pregnancy despite being asked not to. But then the boss decided to add potential injury to the insult.
When the worker asked to be moved away from cigarette smoke and allowed to sit down, her boss refused because she didn’t ‘look disabled.’
“Recently the cigarette smoke has been horrendous, and being newly pregnant, I reached out to my doctor for a note (since my manager always requires one),” the worker explained. When she then approached her boss about the issue, she was snidely asked “If I just wasn’t planning on working anymore.”
The boss then scolded the worker for being seen on security cameras “sitting at the register while taking orders” without a doctor’s note, saying she had to sit down.
The mom-to-be was obviously stunned, but it got worse from there. “She then proceeded to tell me how she doesn’t understand why I can’t work with the cigarette smoke and why I needed to sit because I didn’t ‘look disabled.'”
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What’s truly absurd, aside from the cruel indifference, is that the worker DOES actually have a chronic health condition which qualifies as a disability, and which she has documented with the boss in question.
Roll it all together, and as soon as the boss mentioned disabilities, the worker writes that she “snapped” and “flat out quit,” immediately filing a complaint with HR about the altercation with her boss. “I’ve been working for a long time,” she went on to say, “and it’s sad to think that I don’t think I’ve ever had a good manager.”
What her boss did isn’t just cruel. It is in some cases illegal under both the ADA and the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.
In her post, the mom-to-be asked fellow Redditors if she has “any legal recourse” over her employer’s actions, and there are two ways she might. One would be under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), though it would of course depend on the nature of the disability she has.
It’s also important to note that many complications of pregnancy qualify as disabilities under the ADA and the law requires employers with more than 15 employees to accommodate them.
But recent landmark legislation may well be this woman’s best bet. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Actwhich went into effect in 2023, requires employers with more than 15 employees to provide “reasonable accommodation” of any “limitations related to, affected by, or arising out of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions.”
Needing to sit down and not inhale cloud after cloud of cigarette smoke seems like things that would fit easily under this umbrella. And if it doesn’t, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission says there are more than 30 states and cities with legal protections for pregnant workers, so be sure to check your local rules if you’re in this situation.
The worker told her fellow Redditors that she would definitely be looking into potential violations of these laws at her job. Hopefully, it works in her favor — and her employer learns for the future now to avoid unnecessary drama by simply being kind and reasonable. It’s truly not that hard.
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, social justice and human interest topics.
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