Hey guys, this one is a much needed sanity check and it's gonna be a long one.

Hey guys, this one is a much needed sanity check and it's gonna be a long one.

I'd been working for a respectable company in the blockhain space (fully remote) for almost 2 years now. Started at the bottom, but went up the ranks rather quickly in my time and ended up running a whole department for over a year.

Last week I was fired - and while I was fully expecting and prepared to end my collaboration with the company, the way it was done was very ugly.

Here's what happened. I am now 5 weeks away from the due date with my first child. My superiors were notified of my pregnancy when I entered my second trimester as some big stuff happened in the company and I was promoted into a shareholder (was getting a share of the profit with added responsibility). The agreement between my US-based superior and me (Serbia-based) was that I was to go on maternity leave 1 month before my due date and get back by year's end. I was to get my department to run without me in that time, so the quality of output wouldn't suffer in my absence. With some bumps along the way, I did what was asked of me.

However, with another person having my superior's ear on certain matters and meddling in things he knows nothing about regarding the processes and performance of my department, the C level got us (my dept) on a black list. We all got a warning at the beginning of May to shape up or get fired at the beginning of June. Given that the issues pointed out were not our fault, it took us just a few days to get everything resolved (even though the deadline was 3 weeks).

I told my team that there have been ongoing issues with the meddler and that it was now starting to endanger the whole department. I was leaving the company anyway (was seriously thinking about just plain quitting, because the leave was to be unpaid) and warned the team to start looking for other employment just in case the C level decided to replace everyone in my absence.

Since then, the meddler was fired for his own inefficiency that was affecting all other departments. But the atmosphere was tense - mostly because we were losing clients left and right because of market conditions - but otherwise okay.

Until on May 31 an email came terminating contracts with my department and some others. Basically, half the company was fired over night. I wasn't given a heads up, nor was I aware of who exactly was fired. My people came to me with questions I did not have answers for after the warnings I gave them.

I knew that's how my superiors do things - they boast how we are a family and then burn your email and tell you you're done - but I was actually offended that I was given the same treatment after all my time and sweat and tears put into the company.

I knew that paid leave was not going to happen, which wasn't sitting right with me because in Serbia women get 1 year off for newborn care, with full salary and are protected by the law from termination once the pregnancy is disclosed. I hoper they would offer some amount as salary in my absence, but I somehow made my peace with it not happening as much as I could. But I expected to have a conversation about it with my superior and possibly end things on my terms. Instead, before that could happen, I got the same impersonal emal as the guy I hired 2 months ago and a call with my superior where nothing was said.

He expected me to ask questions and try to change his mind about the cleansing, but when that didn't happen, he just said I had been right about the meddler all along "if that makes me feel better". No, it absolutely doesn't because he put certain things in motion which led to my department being surgically removed from the company!

Even though I didn't close the door with the company on coming back after my maternity leave, I know in my bones I can't go back. I watched them being unfair to others and did my best to do things better within my own department. I expected something like this to happen. But I thought the guy who planned the future of my department and the company for months would have the decency to wait until I have to leave or have the call about it before firing us all in the same way.

It's not in my nature to keep quiet about things like this, but I handled the whole situation calmly and did not go around telling other new hired people I worked closely with how they blatantly fired a pregnant woman completely disregarding her mental and financial state in this precarious moment. Other than my superiors and closest team members, no one knew I was pregnant, and I believe they used that to their advantage in justifying their reasons for firing. Even I didn't get that explanation, not that it matters much at this point.

For the sake of this child I'm carrying, I kept my cool and didn't get into an argument. I am proud of that. But I feel very hurt and unsettled. I feel wronged. And I feel that I would betray my ethic code by going back to that company after what they did after I saved their behinds more than once.

Am I insane for not giving my (now former) superior a piece of my mind and not closing that door forever? Or am I completely wrong in feeling this way - like they owed me a semblance of respect here?