The employment area is one in which there are traps for the unwary and minefields all over the place waiting to blow up your case. One of the first is the short statute of limitations on many cases. One of the shortest time limitation is sometimes found in the “whistleblower” statutes and the filing of claims or suits in the area of termination for reporting patient abuse cases. Without going into the times for all of the different causes of action, the shortest seems to be 90 days after being terminated for reporting patient abuse by a nursing home or care facility. For example, failure to get your suit filed within the 90 day period prevents you from bringing the claim (unless the facility failed to warn you of the short time limit when you were hired, then you have 2 years). Another short statute is the Texas governmental whistleblower statute which is also 90 days, but it has a requirement that you first file with the government’s grievance plan. The Title VII discrimination laws require a filing with the EEOC within 300 days and the Texas state anti-discrimination laws require filing with the Texas Workforce Commission Civil Rights Division within 180 days. One of the really unjust limitations is when an employee is suing a public school and is required to exhaust his administrative remedies by first filing a grievance proceeding. Some of these limits are very short, only a few days or weeks. What this all means is you should consult with a lawyer quickly after being terminated, if you believe that it involves the whistleblower laws or discrimination laws or you could lose your case before it even gets started. Or as they say – DOA “dead on arrival”.