My situation is as follows. I am employed by a large corporation in Georgia. In February of this year I went on 6 weeks of short term disability due to mental stress. The condition upon me being released to return to work was that my work load be lightened; however, it took them a month to do anything. I was still having panic/anxiety attacks at work and decided that I needed to see a psychiatrist instead of just a therapist. My psychiatrist diagnosed me a possible bi-polar type II in early may and started me on an anti-depressant. However, the anti-depressant he put me on swung me in stages of bi-polar type I. During the time of taking the drug, I was having problems adjusting to it and was having problems getting up in the morning; therefore, I would often be 10-15 minutes late to work. I noticed this was becoming a pattern and decided that I would let my supervisor know of the situation. Then in late May, my supervisor called me into her office, right as I was getting ready to leave because I had a dental appointment the day before and was in pain, and explained to me that she was going to have to put me on a PIP (Performance Improvement Plan) due to my tardiness and unplanned PTO. She also then suggested that I had come back from disability too early and should consider going out again, so I went to my psychiatrist and told him of the situation and he put me on disability. I was on short term disability again for 2 and 1/2 months. I take responsibility for the tardiness and unplanned PTO; but, here is where I want to know if I am being discriminated against. There is another woman in my department that is basically my supervisor's "right had woman" that has the same pattern of tardiness and unplanned PTO as I do, yet she has not been placed on a PIP. When I mention this to my supervisor she claims that this person is stopping by another location twice a week to pick up items; however, she is late every morning and there was an email sent out almost 4 weeks ago that stated this "right hand woman" would not be doing this service anymore. I have been back at work now for 3 weeks and have complained to HR that there is discrimination in the department based on favortisim and they claim it isn't. Am I being discriminated against because one person in the department is getting away with things that I have been written up for? Things that if I were to be late again I would be terminated for. I would like to say that it is age discrimination because this person is older than I am and there are 2 of us in the department that have been written up for this situation and it happens to be we are the youngest 2 people in the department. However, I know that age discrimination laws do not cater to younger people. I just feel my supervisor is playing favorites and letting this one person get away with things that I cannot and one other person cannot. The other person that has been written up for this is a good friend of mine and she was told that I am a "bad influence" and that perception is everything in the company and you should be careful who you hang out with. I feel like this other person is getting written up either because she is young like me or just simply because she socializes with me. I hope that I have been clear and that you can guide me in the right direction. I feel like I need to be contacting an attorney for a lawsuit. Please help. Sorry so long but I thought you might want to know the whole situation since I feel this borders on disability discrimination.

You can read more about what constitutes discrimination on the basis of a mental condition by reading the US Equal Employment Opportunity website. It may be found at: http://www.eeoc.gov/

Good luck and let me know if you have other questions.

I have read all the guidelines; but they still leave me a little confused. I am asking the opinions of the people who provide advice as a service on this board. Does this seem like a situation that is discriminatory? I have told my supervisor and HR that I would be hiring an attorney. Am I protected from them firing me because it could be construed as retailiation? :confused:

It is only discriminatory if the termination is a retaliatory measure against your complaint. If your employer can prove that the termination was due to other reasons, such as your job performance, a violation of the rules by you or because of business conditions, it will not be seen as discrimination.

While on the surface, it sounds suspiciously like discrimination and retaliation, there must be a lot more investigation before it can be determined. For example, it could be that the person you are discussing is in a job where timeliness is not as critical to the operation. I once worked for a company where we hired janitors and housekeeping staff. It was more harmful for the business to have the janitor arrive late in comparison to one of the office staff, because of requirements placed on the company by its client.

My suggestion is that you contact the EEOC and discuss it with them. While you can try to hire an attorney, most attorneys will only handle your case for a fee. Contingency types of arrangements are typically found in cases where the EEOC has already found cause (or reason to believe) that discrimination or retaliation exists OR when there is a clear cut issue of discrimination and retaliation.

Let me know if you have any other questions.