What happens when a worker’s medical leave is questioned because of a new boss entering the picture?

In this Reddit post, a worker tackles her new boss’s skepticism while still protecting her rights.

Is the employee following the book on her medical leave or is there something more the new boss has caught onto?

The following Reddit post gets into it all below.

Track FMLA Time? You Betcha!

So, my wife has some health problems and has fully certified and signed off on FMLA (thats the Family Medical Leave Act.

For those not in the U.S., this is the big time federal government “You do not mess with this” medical leave). Job knew this when she was hired, and they had flexible schedules.

So whenever she would have a flare up she’d just flex it. [She’d have a] couple hours off now, then she’d make the time back up later in the week. Boss knew this, was cool with this, everything was great.

This sounds like the perfect situation for someone with FMLA.

Cue new boss coming in.

Couple months go by, new boss tells my wife repeatedly “You’re doing great! No notes, keep doing what you’re doing!”

Now, new boss is an old-school boomer Karen, and my wife has two big brass ones and isn’t afraid to tell a Karen to sit down and be quiet and refuses to take her crap. So, total shock to everyone, a few months later without notice or warning, called into HR.

An HR call has just never been good in the history of the workplace…

HR tries to go on about the FMLA stuff, saying she hasn’t been filing her FMLA claims and that she’s scamming the company and blah blah blah. So she tells them “One moment, I know an FMLA expert with 15 years of experience. Let me call him. Hey honey, you got a minute?”

Yeah, did I mention I’ve worked with FMLA at a national corporate level for years and years? FINALLY came in handy!

“No dear, FMLA counts as time worked. You’ve been flexing to make up your time, so it cannot be counted against your FMLA limit. If you need to take FMLA, it’s hours worked and does not need to be made up, under federal law. They can insist you use PTO alongside it, but they cannot tell you to make it up or they’re committing a felony.”

Okay, we’re loving the power couple vibes. But how did Karen Boss take it?

I could hear the dead silence on the phone.

Wife finally speaks up “So, if the problem is that I haven’t been properly applying for FMLA, I’ll be happy to do so and stop making my time up. I’m gonna have to push these projects back since I won’t have as much time to work on them as I thought, since I won’t be allowed to make up my time anymore. If you want to authorize some overtime, we can work that out.”

Turns out Karen Boss just didn’t like the fact that my wife is Work From Home and she couldn’t micro-manage her. Thought she’d get HR to help scare her straight.

They were absolutely NOT prepared for someone to know more about their claims than they did.

Wow, ya’ll came prepared to throw down…

Karen Boss tried a few more times to throw her weight around. Each time, my wife responded with some variation of “I am not legally allowed to do that, and I have been instructed by corporate to file all time as protected FMLA.”

Threats of discipline were met with “Go ahead. I’m the only one you’ve got who can do X job. I work here because I enjoy it, or at least I used to. Write me up if you feel the need, but please know when you do that will be the start of my 2 week notice.”

Wow, can we all have what she’s having? This confidence is perfection.

And she’s stuck to her guns. Any time she needs to take FMLA time off, she does so. Files everything properly, and Karen Boss can just sit and stew because there’s not a damned thing she can do about it.

It’s been about a month now. Boss Karen has finally realized that she’s got about as much weight as a feather. HR has gone completely silent, and things have overall gotten much better for the wife since she’s got much less stress now. Karen Boss keeps communications short, direct, and to the point, just how my wife likes it.

That’s great Boss Karen laid off, but is your wife’s future protected?

Could they fire her for some unrelated reason once the current crunch is done? Sure, but she’s already got bites from multiple other companies and we can afford to have her not work for a month or two if worst comes to worse.

And we of course have a giant Cover Your *** folder full of names and dates and everything else where Karen Boss tried to retaliate, made for a hostile work place, etc.

They’re not only a power couple, they’re seemingly A+ students!

Know your rights, people, and do NOT be afraid to stand up for yourself!

Legal matters in the workplace can get tricky.

Let’s see how Reddit views this situation.

Some Redditors assumed Karen didn’t have many options after HR.

Another Redditor told their story of what they endured under FMLA in the workplace.

One user admitted they had worked in HR and knew a lot about their strategy.

And there was even one user who wished they’d known this power couple back when they were on FMLA.

It’s unfortunate that anyone should have to defend their rights to stay healthy in the workplace, but it does happen.

This couple did everything right in not only defending this woman’s rights, but having the materials to back it up.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.