Rent A Center Forced to go on Maternity Leave at 4mnths pregnant Charleston South Carolina

I have been working for RentaCenter for a year. In Feburary I helped my co-worker deliver a very heavy TV up a flight of stairs. I went home from work and that night my husband rushed me to the hospital. We found out we were 4wks pregnant. My husband spoke to my manager the following day and I stayed home to rest.

About 2wks went by and I began to be very sick. So sick some mornings I could not get out of bed. I still went to work just late and stayed until I couldn't take no more. The morning sickness was overwhelming. It lasted up until 14wks. I continued working just not leaving the office to much.

Before I found out I was pregnant I had delivered a range(stove) by myself at a location thirty five minutes from the store in the rain. To a old lady in a trailer. This happpened the week before I found out I was pregnant. I always did what I had to do if I was out on the road alone to get or give the merchandise.

My store mgr treated me like I was one of the guys. He had his assisant(male) stay in the store with him all the time while me and another male would be out in the field. Doing deliveries and pick ups of all sorts! Upstairs, downstairs, in the rain or whatever.

The assisant sat in the store doing sales and the showroom most of the time because the store mgr wanted him to stay in the store with him. Mind you I have two kids at home and a husband.

Everything was all fine and dandy until I got pregnant the store started going down and the store mgr and the district blamed some of that on my pregnancy said because I wasn't at a hundred precent.

So on May 12, 2008 around 9am I arrived to work to find out that I could not clock in. The store manager said that I had to take the leave or be terminated. Mind you I just told him that my husband got laid off 3wks prior and that we were trying to move into a house in the next 6wks.

Like I said before I am 4mnths pregnant and have a four and three year old at home my store manager knows all of this. He has a wife and a dog thats it! So of course he doesn't understand. So they told me to go home and that they would pay me for that day and forced me to go on my two weeks vacation that I wasn't ready to take.

The HR director told me to try to find a job bagging groceries or something, the district mgr told me basically that the store was going down and that he didn't want the store mgr to lose his job because he is his friend, my store mgr acted like everything was out of his hands.

So what am I suppose to do. I have already spoken to a lawyer and she has giving me some steps to take but I have bills to pay and no one is going to hire a 4mnth pregnant lady!

Just me
Charleston, South Carolina
U.S.A.