Pregnant employee gets even with nosy coworkers, effectively offloading work and starting maternity leave early: 'I'm due tomorrow but they say it could take a while'

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Jan 7, 2025 2:00 PM EST

Having kids inevitably makes one's work-life balance a bit more complicated. This is, of course, the understatement of the century, and yet despite the fact that finding this balance has always been a challenge for most soon-to-be parents, employers, coworkers, and colleagues all still find new ways of making the transition even more difficult. 

The most obvious inconsistency that comes with this transition is the issue of maternity leave. The fact that a friend of mine who works at a law firm can get a much-deserved six months of leave while a teacher friend of mine has to use their sick days and then apply for a fraction of that amount of time for leave at just 60% pay is an embarrassment that we should all take issue with. No one should be more deserving of more leave than others. 

However, on top of that seemingly unsolvable societal wrong, there are countless more ways in which employees are treated poorly as they prepare for children. There's the shame that comes with leaving your managers and coworkers in tougher positions, and sometimes, those managers and coworkers play into this shame by guilting employees even more. Keep scrolling below for this pregnant employee's story about her conflict with nosy coworkers.

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    20%
    via Unsplash+ (Andrej Lišakov)

    This image is for illustration only, and the subjects are models; the image does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • At 36 weeks, this employee was sick and tired of receiving frustrating comments from others in her office about when she was going on leave. So, after receiving one too many unnecessary “jokes” about this, she decided to overshare to the point that her leave unofficially started early.

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    Office pregnancy plot twist Here my story... So, I work from home because I'm 36 weeks pregnant, and my boss has been super understanding, letting me set my own hours. However,
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    some of my coworkers (mostly the ones who don't work from home) have been constantly asking me when I'm going on maternity leave and making comments like, "Oh, you must be SO close to popping!" every day.
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    It started getting on my nerves because they didn't seem to realize I still had work to do, and it wasn't just about baby time for me. So, I decided to play a little prank.
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    I started deliberately over- exaggerating my symptoms in emails: "Feeling like my feet are about to explode from swelling,
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    can barely sit at my desk, but powering through...LOL" or "Just had to get up and walk around because baby's kicking so much, almost fell out of my chair."
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    And guess what? The next day, I get an email from one of the coworkers saying, "You should really take it easy, you're making us all worried."
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    So, I replied, "Thanks! Actually, I'm due tomorrow, but they say it could take a while."
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    And then....crickets. No more questions, no more comments about how pregnant I was. My petty revenge worked perfectly!
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    TL;DR: Coworkers kept commenting on my pregnancy, so I started exaggerating symptoms, made them all think I was way closer to delivering, and now they won't bring it up again!
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  • Good luck to everyone else who has to take on her responsibilities now!

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    Cheezburger Image 10451273216
    via Unsplash+ (Natalia Blauth)
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    Realistic_Ad_6... Nice! Weird how it stopped being funny after you joined in.
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    daynerz619 This reminded me of someone at my old job. Not pregnancy related, however. I had dyed my hair purple, and my boss kept telling me I looked like Barney. Finally,
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    after getting fed up with his bullsh when he called me Barney, I told him I'm not fo. He said he didn't call me f, and he never called me Barney again.
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    humanityrus I had the usual comments about how big my belly was, which gets so annoying. But I had one male Coworker that was always so smooth and good with the compliments, and he saw me a couple of weeks before
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    due date and said "you're looking really good, you can't be due for a while now !" I loved him. Once he had a stalker who sent him a huge bouquet of red roses at work
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    on Valentines Day and he walked around the office handing out single roses to all the women. So smooth!
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    gogoghoul 13 It's so Weird and almost creepy how invested people at work get when someone pregnant.
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    kade_v01d this is me rn people won't stop asking me when i'm having my baby, like i'm barely past 8 months, leave me alone❤❤
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  • 20
    HouseElf1 That's because now they're afraid you'll ask for help. Hahahaha
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terrible coworkers workplace-stories pregnancy work stories toxic-workplace job work coworkers Office reddit thread Reddit company toxic-work-environment
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