Dr. Pamela Mehta is a Board-Certified Orthopedic Surgeon who is currently the owner of Resilience Orthopedics in San Jose, California.
But besides being a highly skilled surgeon — seriously, google her; she has outstanding reviews — she's a mother to three beautiful children.
In her TikTok — which has over 16 million views — Dr. Mehta explains how she was asked if she planned on having kids during a job interview. She hesitantly took the job, only to feel like she was treated differently because she was a woman.
Things got worse after she got pregnant, but she continued working hard — even going back six weeks after giving birth.
Six months later, when she got pregnant again, her employer started to push her out. Luckily, she hired legal help, and, for the next couple of years, she focused on work until she was able to open her own practice.
In the comments of her video, a high amount of working moms — particularly those in the medical field — spoke out about how much they related to Dr. Mehta's experience.
So BuzzFeed spoke to Dr. Mehta to get more insight on her specific experience and what being a working mom means to her.
"When my former employer asked me if I planned to have kids, I was frustrated because I knew I would be penalized for saying yes, yet I still wanted the job because it was a coveted position. I also knew the question was illegal, but that is just how it goes — a lot of questions are asked of women in the workplace that are not legal, and we just have to deal with it."
"Orthopedic surgery is a field traditionally full of white males. Only about 6% of orthopedic surgeons in the US are females — and even less are minority females like myself. Society and this country do not support working women having children, and I faced even more of this struggle being in a traditionally male-dominated field," she explained.
