Я ушёл с работы пораньше, потому что у меня была температура.

Ушёл is the past tense of уйти, a perfective verb. It presents the action as a completed event: the speaker left work.

A native English speaker often compares:

• Я ушёл с работы = I left work / I went home from work
• Я уходил с работы = I was leaving work / I left work (in the sense of the process or repeated action, depending on context)

In this sentence, the speaker means a single completed action, so ушёл is the natural choice.

Also, ушёл is masculine singular past. A female speaker would say ушла.

Only ушёл changes:

• male speaker: Я ушёл с работы пораньше...
• female speaker: Я ушла с работы пораньше...

That is because past tense verbs in Russian agree with gender in the singular.

The rest of the sentence stays the same:

• пораньше
• потому что
• у меня была температура

Note that была does not change here, because it agrees with температура, which is a feminine noun.

In Russian, the idiomatic expression is уйти с работы = to leave work.

Here:

• с = from/off
• работы = genitive singular of работа

So literally it is something like from work.

Russian often uses с with places or activities like this:

• уйти с работы = leave work
• прийти со школы = come back from school
• уйти с урока = leave class

By contrast, из is more typical for coming out of an enclosed place:

• выйти из офиса = come out of the office
• выйти из дома = come out of the house

So с работы is the normal expression here.

Работы is genitive singular.

That is because the preposition с in the sense of from/off requires the genitive:

• с работы
• со стола
• с урока

So:

• dictionary form: работа
• after с: с работы

Пораньше means earlier or a bit earlier, often with the sense of earlier than usual / earlier than expected.

So:

• Я ушёл пораньше = I left a bit early / earlier than usual

Compared with раньше:

• раньше can mean earlier, before, or even in the past / formerly
• пораньше is more specifically a little earlier or somewhat earlier

Examples:

• Я пришёл раньше = I arrived earlier
• Я пришёл пораньше = I arrived a bit early / a little earlier than normal

In this sentence, пораньше sounds very natural because the idea is leaving work early.

Because потому что introduces a subordinate clause: because I had a fever.

Russian normally places a comma before subordinate clauses, so:

• Я ушёл с работы пораньше, потому что у меня была температура.

This is standard punctuation.

Russian usually does not express possession with a verb like English have in this kind of sentence.

Instead, it uses the structure:

• у + genitive + быть

So:

• у меня была температура
• literally: at me was a temperature
• natural English: I had a fever / I had a temperature

This у меня structure is extremely common:

• у меня есть машина = I have a car
• у меня был вопрос = I had a question
• у меня была температура = I had a fever

Using я имел температуру would sound unnatural here.

Because температура is a feminine singular noun, and in the past tense быть agrees with the subject in gender and number.

So:

• температура была
• not температура был

Compare:

• у меня был кашель = I had a cough (кашель is masculine)
• у меня была температура = I had a fever (температура is feminine)
• у меня было давление = I had blood pressure issues / my blood pressure was up (давление is neuter)

So была is there because of температура, not because of я.

Yes. In Russian, температура can literally mean temperature, but in everyday health-related speech it often means a fever / a raised temperature.

So:

• У меня температура usually means I have a fever
• not just I possess a temperature

The medical context makes the meaning clear.

Yes, it can.

Уйти с работы may mean either:

1. leave work for the day, or
2. leave one’s job / quit

The context tells you which meaning is intended.

In this sentence, because of:

• пораньше = early
• потому что у меня была температура = because I had a fever

the meaning is clearly I left work early, not I quit my job.

If someone says simply:

• Он ушёл с работы

that could potentially mean either He left work or He quit his job, depending on context.

Yes. Russian word order is fairly flexible, though the original sentence is very natural.

You could also say:

• Потому что у меня была температура, я ушёл с работы пораньше.

This puts the reason first: Because I had a fever, I left work early.

You could also emphasize other parts, for example:

• Я пораньше ушёл с работы, потому что у меня была температура.

That is possible too, though Я ушёл с работы пораньше... sounds the most neutral and natural.

Ушёл is pronounced roughly oo-SHYOL.

The letter ё always indicates the yo sound. In careful writing, it is written as ё, although in many printed texts Russians sometimes write е instead and expect the reader to know the word.

So you may sometimes see:

• ушел

but it is still pronounced ушёл.

For learners, it is very helpful to remember the stressed ё here.