A West Des Moines mother who said she quit her job because she didn’t have a place to express breast milk for her newborn has filed a civil rights complaint against the employer.
On Angela Ames’ first day back at Nationwide Advantage Mortgage in Des Moines after a maternity leave, she was told she couldn’t access one of the company’s lactation rooms for at least three days, Ames states in a discrimination complaint with the Iowa Civil Rights Commission.
Under federal law, employers must give breastfeeding workers a reasonable break time and a private place other than a bathroom to express breast milk for one year after the child’s birth. Accommodation for breastfeeding has been the subject of recent public discussion. It was debated in the Iowa Legislature in the spring, and it was included in the new federal health reform law.
Ames, 32, tried to keep working that day in July, but her breasts were engorged and leaking milk, making her extremely uncomfortable, she said in the complaint.
In an interview, she said she couldn’t find an alternative place to use her electronic pump. The bathroom wasn’t an option because there was no electricity in the private stalls, and she didn’t think it was appropriate to expose herself to everyone who came into the bathroom, she said.
Ames said she considered going home to pump, but that would be time consuming, and she knew she’d need to pump again three hours later. So she resigned.
Nationwide spokeswoman Liz Christopher said the company, based in Columbus, Ohio, doesn’t have a policy requiring a three-day wait for lactation rooms.
“Nationwide supports working parents and nursing mothers through a variety of policies and programs,” Christopher said. “In fact, Nationwide offers a lactation program for associates who are also nursing mothers, which includes providing private and secure rooms exclusively devoted to lactation purposes, comfortable chairs, electrical breast pump if necessary, secure storage for expressed milk, and on-site occupational nurse specialists.”
In an interview, Ames responded: “If they don’t have a policy, why didn’t they let me into a lactation room then?”
Ames’ complaint states that she had been a loss mitigation specialist in the mortgage division since October 2008. Pregnant with her second son, she began to have complications, including pre-term labor. She had to go to the hospital almost every week to get shots to stop the contractions, then she was on doctor-ordered bedrest for a month before her son was born May 18.
Ames said her immediate supervisor and a human resources official agreed she could be on leave until Aug. 2. But her department head called June 21 to say that her short-term disability leave would expire July 12, and Ames’ position would be held only until July 19.
Ames agreed to return to work on July 19. After she began the process to get her computer system running, she asked a security guard for access to a lactation room. He directed her to the staff nurse.
The nurse “informed me that it was Nationwide’s policy that I fill out paperwork to be placed on the list for the lactation rooms and that there was a three-day waiting period while this paperwork was processed,” Ames said in her complaint.
Because it had been more than three hours since she’d last nursed her baby, she told the nurse she’d need to pump within an hour. According to Ames, the nurse said she could use a sickness room, but the safety of her milk couldn’t be guaranteed, and the lock on the door was broken.
A sick person was using that room, so Ames went to meet with her supervisor to discuss work. He told her she had two weeks to catch up on the backlog accumulated during her leave “or I would start receiving write-ups,” Ames said. He repeatedly stressed that she’d need to work overtime. She agreed.
“By this time, I’m leaking milk,” she said in an interview.
At her desk, Ames began to feel anxiety. Her older son hadn’t gained enough weight from nursing, so Ames put him on baby formula. Ames was determined to help her newborn, born five weeks early, to breastfeed. She knew long periods between nursing or expressing milk could cause her milk supply to decrease.
“I felt that I had no choice but to resign immediately,” she said.
Ames said she and her husband, a union electrician who was recently laid off for nine months, have struggled financially.
Her lawyer, Brooke Timmer of Urbandale, said new mothers shouldn’t be faced with Ames’ choice – “to quit and walk out, rather than give up breastfeeding that day.”
Ames’ complaint is under investigation.
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