I feel like because I am not going to fight for what is fair and right, I’m letting not only myself down but the MS community as a whole, but I just don’t have the money or stamina to fight a multi-million dollar organization and end up losing. These situations are the reason ADA and discrimination laws came to be and it turns my stomach to think they’ll get by with it but I have to do what is right for me financially and not bring on any unneeded additional stress.

Every year the subject of our annual member’s picnic comes up and every year I get harassed about it. My boss goes to the location on a Saturday – unpaid, which in and of itself is a violation of our agreement since she’s an hourly employee – and sits out in the hot sun and makes sure our members have enough alcohol to get drunk, which is obviously very important. Every year I get snide remarks about how I’ll have to take this over as part of her position. Well, I had already worked it out with a co-worker – I was going to delegate it to her since she goes to the picnic every year anyway. Every situation that MS could potentially screw with me on, I had a workaround.

I had another discussion with the manager last week and she said I would be required to do the picnic as part of her job. WTH? What difference does it make if I’m there personally? I pointed out to her that our boss can’t legally force me to do something that I am physically unable to do due to a valid, documented medical condition (MS) which he and my immediate supervisor are aware that I have. This is not a valid part of any office job description – sitting out in the hot sun on a weekend, donating your time to the company and watching drunks make idiots of themselves! LMAO

She also mentioned that I would have to move to her office area, which has terrible airflow problems. It’s always too hot on that side of the room. I told her I didn’t think I could move to that area because of it and she said it wasn’t an option. I said I’d hate to think that our boss would want me to pass out at work! I also mentioned that it “could” be (I know damned well it is) a violation of ADA.

She then went on to say she didn’t know why I wanted her position anyhow and that I could get a medical excuse, etc., but that our boss would make my life a living hell because of it. He already calls her on some weekends and she’s had to come in (unpaid). She is expected to be at his beck and call and if I took the promotion, I would be too.

She pretty much ended the talk with go home and talk it over with your husband but I don’t think either of you will be happy if you take this position!

Long story short, I’m going to inform them within the next couple of weeks that I don’t want the promotion, I’ll stay in my current position. I’ll just suck it up and give up any aspirations I had for becoming the manager. It’s too bad too, because I had a lot of good ideas on how to improve our work, make us all more efficient and save the organization money, but I guess they’ll never know now.