I live in Marietta, GA and have been working in food service management for 12 years now. This is probably one of the most bizarre experiences I’ve had with the corporate side of the industry. I took a week of planned PTO (the only time I’ve taken in the 7 months I’ve been with the company) and ended up aggravating a herniated disc I have in my neck. I still returned to work as normal but soon found it hard to make it through a shift. So I ended up calling off on my next shift, then had to come in late the following shift, then called out again and went to the ER. Mind you, I have no insurance so I’m having to get all of this done out of pocket. My DM tells me if I have to miss anymore time I have to submit it into our leave portal since it would be more than 3 shifts. Next shift rolls around, I think I’ll be ok, I get a couple hours in and nope, gotta go home. Next day find myself back in urgent care and can’t get a spine and pain appointment until Monday. Great. All my leave is put in and so we just wait for the appointment.

Appointment comes, get some cool new meds, but nothing else until an MRI. I can’t afford one out of pocket, fuck. New year isn’t far, I’ll have insurance then so no huge issue. For now I just need work note so I can return. Work excuse says I can return Wednesday but no lifting more than 20lbs and I need to take a break every hour. Benefits rejects it, says they need to know how long of a break. Dr says 10 minutes.

Tl;dr: Neck pain. Broke man. ER. Missed work. Forced medical leave. Dr says no lifting over 20lbs and 10 minute break every hour.

Now this is where I need help. My DM just told me they are going to have to terminate me because they cannot accommodate my restrictions. Specifically the breaks. Since they can’t accommodate me they would have to terminate me because they can’t hold my job since it won’t be under FMLA (haven’t been with the company a year yet). This doesn’t seem legal…. Am I crazy? Or is this mad illegal.