ATLANTA — In a brief filed in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Georgia and co-counsel Buckley Beal LLP argued that their client, Alisha Coleman, was subjected to unlawful workplace discrimination when she was fired for experiencing a heavy period, a symptom of premenopause. 
 
 “Employers have no business policing women’s bodies or their menstrual cycles,” said Andrea Young, ACLU of Georgia executive director. “Firing a woman for getting her period at work is offensive and an insult to every woman in the workplace. A heavy period is something nearly all women will experience, especially as they approach menopause, and Alisha was shamed, demeaned and fired for it. That’s wrong and illegal under federal law. We’re fighting back.” 
 
 “Federal law is supposed to protect women from being punished, harassed or fired because of their sex, and being fired for unexpectedly getting your period at work is the very essence of sex discrimination,” said Galen Sherwin, Senior Staff Attorney at the Women’s Rights Project of the ACLU. “This kind of blatant discrimination against women in the workplace is why the ACLU Women’s Rights Project was founded 45 years ago, and why the fight for gender equality must continue.” 
 
 Coleman was employed as a 911 call taker for the Bobby Dodd Institute, a job training and employment agency in Fort Benning, Georgia where she had worked for nearly a decade, when she was fired in 2016 for experiencing two incidents of sudden onset, heavy menstrual flow, a symptom of premenopause. 
 
 “I loved my job at the 9/11 call center because I got to help people,” said Coleman. “Every woman dreads getting period symptoms when they’re not expecting them, but I never thought I could be fired for it. Getting fired for an accidental period leak was humiliating. I don’t want any woman to have to go through what I did, so I’m fighting back.” 
 
 Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits workplace discrimination on the basis of sex, including “pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions.” The brief argues that the district court, which dismissed the case in February, erred in ruling that premenopause and the associated sudden-onset heavy menstruation are not protected under Title VII. 
 
 The brief is online here: https://www.acluga.org/sites/default/files/appeal_brief.pdf 
 
 This release is at: https://www.acluga.org/en/press-releases/aclu-appeals-case-georgia-woman-fired-getting-her-period-work 
 
 More information about the ACLU Women’s Rights Project is here: https://www.aclu.org/issues/womens-rights ||||| Update: The ACLU and ACLU-IA filed a brief asking the whole Eighth Circuit to reconsider its decision to deny Angela her day in court, joined by eleven other women’s and employment rights organizations including: 9to5, A Better Balance, The California Women’s Law Center, Gender Justice, Legal Aid Society – Employment Law Center, Legal Momentum, National Center for Lesbian Rights, The National Organization for Women Foundation, The National Women’s Law Center, Women Employed and The Women’s Law Project. 
 
 Imagine you have just returned from maternity leave, still nursing your baby, and you find that your workplace has no place available for you to pump breast milk. After trying for several hours to find a place, you ask for help from your department head, who says “You know, I think it’s best that you just go home to be with your babies.” She hands you a pen and paper, advises you to resign, and even dictates what you should write down as your letter of resignation. 
 
 This is exactly what Angela Ames, a Loss Mitigation Representative at Nationwide Insurance, alleges happened to her when she returned to work eight-weeks after having her second child. 
 
 To begin with, as soon as she got to work, she found another employee’s belongings at her workspace—not exactly a warm welcome. When she informed her department head that she needed a place to pump, she said that was “not her job,” and sent her to the company nurse. The nurse told her that she couldn’t use the company’s lactation room because the company needed three days to processes her “paperwork”—a policy no one had shared with her prior to her return. The nurse advised her that she could try to pump in a room that was frequently used by sick employees with no lock on the door that was currently in use—she should check back in 15-20 minutes. 
 
 While she was waiting, she met with her supervisor, who told her that she would have to make up all the work from her entire leave within two weeks’ time, which would require working significant overtime, or face discipline. She finally returned, in increasing panic and pain from the pressure in her breasts, to her department head to see if there was anything she could do to help her find a place to pump. That’s when the department head made the “just go home to be with your babies” comment and dictated her letter of resignation. 
 
 Were you in Angela’s situation, you might reasonably assume that you were not welcome back at work, and that you were essentially being fired, or at least forced off the job—as Angela did. Unfortunately, a federal appeals court in the Eighth Circuit disagreed, holding that she should have complained to HR before trying to take her employer to court. But because many women don’t know their rights related to pregnancy, leave, or breast pumping , they might not be aware their rights were being violated in the first place. 
 
 Sadly, treatment like Angela faced is far too common for pregnant workers and new moms attempting to negotiate a return to paid work. Our civil rights laws were designed to protect women against this type of sex stereotype—that women will be less committed to their work after having children, or that they should really just “go home to be with [their] babies.” Until our workplaces incorporate conditions for workers to carry healthy pregnancies, recover from childbirth, care for their families, or continue nursing, women won’t have an equal chance at success. 
 
 We can’t accept being told to “just go home.” We need to keep fighting—by educating ourselves and each other about our rights , continuing to press our cases in court , and supporting legislative initiatives like the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act , or similar statutes at the state level. 
 
 If you have experienced discrimination at work like Angela did, tell us your story .
– After working at a 911 call center for nearly 10 years, Alisha Coleman was fired. She says it's because of her period, and the American Civil Liberties Union is arguing gender discrimination is at play. In the brief, Coleman alleges that the Bobby Dodd Institute in Fort Benning, Georgia, gave her a disciplinary write up after the "sudden onset of her menstrual period" caused her to leak fluid onto her chair in August 2015. It happened again the following April, with menstrual fluid spotting the carpet as she made her way to the bathroom. She says she cleaned the spot with bleach, but was fired four days later for failing to "practice high standards of personal hygiene and maintain a clean, neat appearance while on duty." The ACLU calls Coleman's firing "wrong and illegal under federal law," citing Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which bans workplace discrimination based on sex. The crux of the case is that sudden heavy menstrual flow is a symptom of pre-menopause. The New York Daily News reports that Coleman's case was first dismissed by a district court that found the law does not protect the condition of pre-menopause, but the ACLU argues that it fits under Title VII, which prohibits discrimination due to "pregnancy, childbirth and related conditions." USA Today reports that Bobby Dodd has issued a statement saying "there is more to this story than is being portrayed by those who are suing us." (One company actually gives women time off for their periods.)