
Ask HN: I was let go for writing about my depression. What should I do? - fadelakin
So this happened around the middle of October and ever since, I&#x27;ve been trying to process my mind around it. I wrote about my depression and shared it with others. I wrote it as way to sort of come to terms with things and let people know that they aren&#x27;t alone.<p>A couple days after I wrote it, I shared the piece of writing with a couple people on Twitter. I&#x27;m going to guess that my boss must have saw it popup on his timeline which led to me getting a phone call from him. We just talked about it and how I was feeling. He told me to take the next day off. I guess he was trying to be nice and be a good person but the day after the day I was given off, I received another phone call from him. He pretty much said, &quot;I don&#x27;t think it&#x27;s best if you come into work. If you have anything of ours, just return them when you feel like it.&quot; aka we&#x27;re letting you go. He reassured me it wasn&#x27;t because of what I wrote over and over again. I, on the other hand, do think I was let go because of what I wrote. I wasn&#x27;t given an explanation as to why I was being let go. I don&#x27;t and didn&#x27;t think of myself as a liability but I guess that&#x27;s how I was viewed.<p>I talked to a couple people about it. Some said he was in his right to let me go, others said it wasn&#x27;t right for me to be let go. I&#x27;m currently on a gap year and all I wanted some work to do and hopefully gain experience from. I can&#x27;t do that and every junior Android developer position I&#x27;ve applied to in Chicago has pretty much turned me down. Chicago doesn&#x27;t have that much junior Android developer positions compared to other cities. I can&#x27;t get the experience I wanted and can&#x27;t earn the money I planned on earning.  At this point, I have no idea what to do. I just work on my own small projects day to day. What do you guys think I should do? Do you think my boss was in his right to let me go even though I didn&#x27;t mention anything about the company in my writing?<p>Any help would be appreciated.
======
neekburm
I wrote an article about the ADA amendments a few years ago:

[https://www.scribd.com/doc/246397486/The-ADAAA-Congress-
Brea...](https://www.scribd.com/doc/246397486/The-ADAAA-Congress-Breathes-New-
Life-into-the-Americans-with-Disabilities-Act)

Major depression, or the perception that someone is depressed, is now
considered a disability that the ADA applies to.

If an employer takes a hostile action (denial of promotion, firing, etc.)
against someone based on their disability, the victim can sue the employer.

Proving that they fired you because of the article will be an issue, but a
skilled disability attorney can probably do that. Presuming that you were
otherwise a good employee, it probably won't be too hard to prove that the
article was the reason. Talk to a disability attorney, or just contact the
EEOC.

[http://www.eeoc.gov/employees/charge.cfm](http://www.eeoc.gov/employees/charge.cfm)

~~~
serf
This is impossible to word without sounding bad, but I'm legitimately curious
as to how the situation would play out:

If a workplace terminated an employee due to writings that the employee wrote
which alienated the rest of the workplace and made them feel unsafe, wouldn't
that be a pretty easy thing to attest in court ,that the termination was not
wrongful but rather motivated by trying to keep a friendly work atmosphere and
ensure workers' safety?

That seems like the thing to focus in on if one were to be defending against
such a case.

~~~
DanBC
> and made them feel unsafe

If a person makes a direct threat then yes, obviously the employer can take
action to protect their work force.

But why do you think of violence when we're talking about mental illness? The
vast majority of violent crime is committed by people who do not have a mental
illness.

Your comment is stigmatizing and ignorant. OP is male. You do not seem to be
askin about the risk of violence because of his maleness even though most
violent crime is commited by men.

About one in six people over 16 have a significant mental health problem. The
US has a population of hundreds of million people over sixteen - let's say
250million. That gives about 41 million people with a significant mental
illness. Each year about 16,000 people are murdered in US, so even if every
single murder was committed by someone with a mental illness you still have
41million (minus 16,000) safe people who have a mental health problem. But
research suggests that only about 10% of mirder is committed by someone with a
mental illness.

[1] using current UK terminology

~~~
serf
>Your comment is stigmatizing and ignorant. OP is male. You do not seem to be
askin about the risk of violence because of his maleness even though most
violent crime is commited by men.

I wrote a big, long diatribe about how wrong it was of you to inject a weird
sexism-hued gender argument, but I erased it.

I don't believe that asking a question is ever stigmatizing if done in good
faith, and my question (which, by the way, is distinct from a comment) is most
certainly in good faith. My question may certainly have been ignorant, but the
removal of such ignorance is exactly the goal of my question! I ask to become
wiser, I promise.

Simply put : I didn't ask about his gender because it wasn't his gender which
alienated me towards him. The product of his authorship; the blog post and the
details therein, is what alienated me towards him.

The blog post, with what dangerously little knowledge of psychology I have,
made me feel as if it were written by a psychopath. I don't care to state
specific reasons publicly. Psychopaths have a larger incidence of
impulsive/threatening/amoral behaviors _by definition_ than so-called 'normal'
behaviors. That's the reason why I feel compelled to think of violence.

My jump towards violence wasn't as vague as 'mentally ill', but rather
specifically towards descriptions of activities within that blog post which I
categorized mentally as psychopathic.

One assumes that his co-workers were untrained in mental health disciplines,
just as I am. I don't think that it is unreasonable to assume that upon
reading the post they may have felt the same way as I did.

Let me distill the actual question for you, so that you can answer the right
one this time.

The question was : "If an employee sues for wrongful termination after writing
a blog post which has the effect of alienating people towards him, wouldn't it
be quite easy to have that workforce testify that "X blog post made me feel
Y.", and if so doesn't this pose a problem for OP and his plans to sue?"

The assumption that question falls upon is that I'm not the only person who
was alienated by the blog post, and I would assume that if the author was
actually an acquaintance that the effect would be stronger.

The question was asked as a hypothetical 'what-if' for possible motives behind
the termination; a piece of the overall brainstorming session behind OPs
lawsuit, and also a chance for me to better understand how laws work regarding
such things. Please use a friendlier tone if you'd care to educate others. I
feel that your passion for finding fair treatment for the ill is preventing
you from reading what I wrote and considering my actual question without
turning into a mouthpiece and discarding the question entirely.

------
ickryricky
As a person who's suffered from depression, and experienced discrimination
because of it, I'd like to encourage you to both sue the shit out of this
asshole, and name the company publicly. Don't be ashamed of your depression,
and don't let people like this continue to get away with abusing those who
suffer from mental illness.

------
andymoe
I think you should talk to a local employment attorney. In the meantime pick
yourself up and look for another job... A change of scenery can help too if
you are not very tied to your location. Also, I hope you find the help you
need. You don't have to take it on all by yourself.

------
stonemetal
The EEO(Equal Employment Opportunity) laws cover mental health so you would
have some legal backing if you want to take that path. Personally I would let
it go and keep up the job search, or if you can afford it maybe contribute to
an open source project.

------
DanBC
You could see a lawyer. Mental illness is one of the "protected
characteristics" covered hy US federal law

But this advice is easy to give for someone who isn't actually in the
situation.

------
sarabmann
By letting you go, your employer lost a courageous and honest resource so it
was not your loss at all.Secondly, I think you don't have serious issue as you
are in the right framework of mind to confront and identify the problem.

Try to take project out of Elance and Odesk and if you think you have real
good skills that are not valued in Chicago then move to place where your skill
set has value. Valley is extremely good technology cluster but Boston,Austin
and Seattle are also not bad.

------
SSH007
While you have my sympathies for what you are going through, it really comes
off petty when you name your employer. In my experience, there are always two
sides to each story. I won't even try to speculate why they might have let you
go. If they were discriminating against you because of your depression, then
there are legal protections that are provided for you. Naming and shaming your
ex employers, does nothing but harm to your future prospects. Prospective
Employers, if they hear about how quickly you publicly shamed/named your
employer when you two did not see eye to eye, will be hesitant to hire you. In
all honesty, I would not.

All We(HNers) have, is your side of the story, there is no defense from the
company that let you go. There is very little upside to publicly naming the
company, unless you do it in legal proceedings.

I'm not sure if its possible, but I'd highly recommend you deleting the
comments where you named the company, or delete this post. It does nobody any
good, especially you. Think about it, what did you gain from naming them. I
was with you until I saw that you named the company. Again it comes off petty
and childish.

You seem fairly young, since you mentioned your experience, so remember that
professionalism goes a long way, and also that Life is not fair. Sometimes
you'll get blamed for something you didn't do, other times you'll be fired for
something shitty like this. Your job is to keep moving ahead all the time, and
don't go down to the level of jerks and become a jerk yourself. Stand up for
yourself, but don't talk behind other people's back. If they wronged you, then
confront them, but give them a chance to defend themselves.

Good luck to you.

~~~
vdaniuk
Wait, how is he going down to the level of jerks by pulicly naming and shaming
a company? Why do you say that? I just don't understand your rationale. This
sounds absurd. Could you elaborate maybe?

Yeah, for some future employers it may seem unprofessional, but I would not
want to work for such employers.

On the contrary, I would recommend to consult a lawyer, sue them, write a blog
about your case and a company, start a movement in the interests of depressed
programmers and involve tech media in all of that. This will have both
positive externalities and benefits for OP: more protection for depresssed
programmers, less incentives for unethical companies to behave like that,
traffic for the OP new blog and possibly several job opportunities.

OP, I consider naming and shaming unethical companies like this to be a
preferred course of action if done strategically.

Yeah, sometimes, when organizations are locked into Nash equilibrium and any
individual actor can't change rules of the game, in that case naming and
shaming is unproductive.

Firing a person who has written about their depression? No excuse. Don't give
them a chanche to protect themselves(WTF?!). Destroy the company. Help others
like you.

EDIT OP, I see you deleted the comments with the name of the company. Please
don't let it slide. Fight for yourself and for others who are suffering from
depression and are being discriminated against.

~~~
fadelakin
I deleted the comments but it doesn't mean I'm not going to fight. I'm just
trying to be civilized. Exposing the company could make things more
complicated and I don't really want that.

~~~
vdaniuk
Good, happy to hear that. As someone who was also struggling with a
depression, among all other methods I'd like to recommend you to try
meditation, yoda and taichi.

Meditation has scientifically proven benefits for people affected with
depression and anxiety. Please look into it!

[http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/meditation...](http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/meditation-
meta-analysis/)

~~~
SSH007
I hope you don't take this the wrong way but this sounds like a much better
advice than the one you gave above. I would not have guessed that both
comments came from the same person, until I checked the username.

------
jaoued
My advice is you must make contact asap with a lawyer who's specialised in
Employment Law. He/she will be best placed to put things together based on
what you have experienced and decide on the best course of action while
gauging if there is or not a case of abusive dismissal. Letting you go while
knowing you are suffering from depression is a serious offence.

------
angersock
Hang in there man. Things get better, even if they seem like they never will.
:)

Keep working on your hobby projects, maybe go enjoy the parks, and maybe see
if there are any little webdev jobs or something available on Craigslist in
your area. Worst case, see if anyone is hiring waiters.

Don't stop reaching out for help, and try not to spend too much time in your
own head. Good luck!

------
dadude
I would also guess that the reason you were let go had more to do with the
admission of addiction history then the depression or the combination of both.

I would get some legal counsel and aim for some form of severance in
combination with continued health benefits (if you had any) rather then
lengthy litigation that will only add to your burden.

Good luck on your difficult journey.

------
fadelakin
You can read the piece of writing I wrote here:
[https://medium.com/@tmidao/confession-55fa5d4a3c0b](https://medium.com/@tmidao/confession-55fa5d4a3c0b)

I'm always happy to clarify on any part that wasn't clear or you need more
information on.

~~~
falsestprophet
Firstly, depression is a serious mental illness with well studied chemical and
therapeutic interventions. See a psychiatrist straight away. A few pills may
really help your cause.

Sign up for Medicaid
([http://www.hfs.illinois.gov/medical/apply.html](http://www.hfs.illinois.gov/medical/apply.html))
and/or talk to the the Cook County Health System psychiatry department
([http://www.cookcountyhhs.org/tag/psychiatry/](http://www.cookcountyhhs.org/tag/psychiatry/))

 _I’ve read the Bible and Qur’an front to back 5 times each. They hold no
meaning to me._

I've run into some hardline Christians and Mormons in the Chicago software
scene and writing that could very well have made you stone cold dead to them.
Is your old boss from Wheaton, Illinois or nearby? That seems to be their
headquarters.

~~~
fadelakin
Actually I live in Indiana but very close to Chicago and commute to Chicago
daily for work....well I did. My boss was from Indiana and I don't think he
was either Christian or Mormon.

I see a psychiatrist and a therapist twice a week. Obviously they're are
cutting into my runway but I figured it's worth it since I've been doing much
better ever since I wrote the piece of writing.

~~~
falsestprophet
Spending three hours a day on the South Shore Line would make anyone
depressed!

I bet you can get a software internship gig near you. Contact professors doing
computational work at Notre Dame ([http://ibms.nd.edu/clusters/computational-
biology-bioinforma...](http://ibms.nd.edu/clusters/computational-biology-
bioinformatics/)) they may have room in their budget. Though the pay will not
be extravagant.

Indeed shows 300+ software gigs in South Bend:
[http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=software&l=South+Bend%2C+IN](http://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=software&l=South+Bend%2C+IN)

But DELETE THE FUCKING ARTICLE man. Obviously, it isn't helping your cause.

Also definitely sue your former employer:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8597953](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8597953)

~~~
krrishd
As pragmatic as your solution of deleting the article is, I don't think that
should be the action Fisher has to take here, it simply doesn't seem fair. If
an employer takes issue with an article like that, then that's your indicator
that they aren't right for you to begin with. But I have no experience with
any of this so I can't conclusively say much.

~~~
fadelakin
Thanks Krish. <3

------
panjaro
Call your boss for Dinner at the top floor of a big building, show him the
cars running on the street, get around him, give a nice kick. Make sure he
screams while falling down, record the clip and post it in Youtube.

------
clark-kent
Let me recommend an audio book for you, "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle
[http://www.audible.com/pd/Religion-Spirituality/The-Power-
of...](http://www.audible.com/pd/Religion-Spirituality/The-Power-of-Now-
Audiobook/B002V0PN36).

------
adamgray
There are lots of lawyers in Chicago that would take your case.

------
_random_
Name and shame?

------
paulhauggis
Everyone seems to love how much power they have with social media. Look at the
ex-Mozilla CEO. He was bullied and forced to quit as a result of his beliefs.

The flip-side is that business owners can also use this power against you. Be
careful what you post on social media, it may come back to get you.

~~~
_RPM
You mean Brendan Eich? He is not just the ex-Mozilla CEO, He also invented
JavaScript.

------
penguindev
Have you read "mans search for meaning"? That guy lived in a concentration
camp, so you probably don't have it that bad...

Hope you find something better than pills and/or paying a shrink for the rest
of your life. I know you can.

~~~
Devthrowaway80
Clinical depression is a physiological condition that produces irrational
negative emotions that are largely _unrelated_ to the sufferer's
circumstances.

Telling a clinically depressed person "buck up, things aren't that bad" is
about as helpful as telling somebody with diabetes that "sugar is actually
pretty tasty, you should just try it again and see if you like it."

Those pills you so casually dismiss prevented me from taking my own life and
have lifted a lifelong fog.

Hope you can find something better to do with your time than writing
incredibly ignorant comments on Hacker News. I know you can.

~~~
penguindev
\- I went through clinical depression myself 10 years ago. I think the OP
deserves a second opinion.

\- I would tell someone with type 2 diabetes to stop taking drugs and instead
stop eating the carbs (of course the politically correct pharmaceutical / govt
response is to take drugs which only treat the symptoms - funny how financial
interests work). Again, first hand experience with this.

~~~
amagumori
if you "went through" clinical depression you didn't have clinical depression.
you felt bad for a while.

