One Year Unemployed

This is an article that feels exceptionally hard to write. I’ve sat down with it a few times, reworking and then restarting it in the hopes that it would sound profound or even motivational. It is no such thing. Instead, I have decided to let myself be as honest as possible in the hopes that this will give me, and maybe you the reader, closure of some sort.

I grew up on the lower end of the economic scale with parents who were just doing their best for their children. I watched my father’s resilience and his dedication to his job while struggling through some really tough times and that truly put an appreciation for hard work into my heart. Because of this, I have often found myself defining worth by how well I could do things and how hard I worked on them.

It started in school. I was a straight “A” student. I didn’t know how not to be. I devoured books at incredible speeds and loved learning so much. As if I wasn’t doing enough work at school, I would come home and pour myself into writing stories and learning various languages through songs and foreign television. Because of my dedication to learning, I was able to skip 11th and 12th grade in favor of an early admissions program at a University in New York.

After a year at that university, I struggled with my career path. I had always been a lover of writing and words, but I was studying Biomolecular Science in the hopes of becoming a pediatrician. My grades were slipping because I wasn’t passionate about it. I took some time off and then enrolled in an English Literature program at a school in Pennsylvania. Once again, my grades were high and I was passionate about the work. In the in-between there, I started working at a grocery store as a cashier. Throughout my college career, I continued to work at the grocery store, moving up the ranks from cashier to Customer Service Associate to Front End Leader with accounting responsibilities. I continued to work at the grocery store for about a year and a half after I graduated from college, though I felt frustrated with it. I was working so many hours a week it felt exhausting to try to apply for jobs, but I did. Just as the grocery store gave me a new responsibility in August 2017- Store Employment Associate- I was offered a job as the Senior Content Developer for a small, family-owned company. It was a dream come true.

I had a boss who truly believed in my skill. He wouldn’t hear of me putting down the quality of my work and he made me feel more confident in my ability to write professionally. He encouraged me to make mistakes and to learn from them. He was always willing to work with me on projects and was equally excited about the projects I clearly put a lot of passion into. He definitely made me feel valued. The day he gave me a key to the building was one of the most important days of my life. It was just a little thing, but I felt so good about it. I felt like I belonged in this career I had worked so hard for.

I know it’s not usual to love your work, but for nearly three years, I loved my career. I got up early for work, arrived early, took short lunches, and passionately devoted myself to what I loved about the job. I was a writer! Finally, everything I had ever wanted! I loved creating content for the new products. I loved reading books and articles about the subject matter! I loved getting myself up to date on new scientific discoveries and learning about how to effectively market on social media. Before this job, I had no idea what SEO was and a few months later, I was optimizing articles that had already been up on the site and writing new ones without batting an eye about how to properly format them. I loved every moment.

Then March 17th, 2020 happened. COVID-19 was still new and everyone was terrified. No one could know the future, and so on St. Patrick’s Day my company announced to nearly half the staff that we were being temporarily furloughed until we could resume at full capacity to minimize how many people were out and about. They encouraged us to sign up for unemployment and assured us it was likely to be temporary. I left with tears in my eyes and deep sadness in my heart. When I returned the key to the HR department, they said “we are sad too,” but I couldn’t even open my mouth to explain the real grief I was feeling. The box full of my desk things stayed in my car for weeks.

You see, growing up poor does something to a person. It makes them realize early on that things are stacked against them pretty much from the get-go. It makes them prioritize work, makes them feel money anxiety, makes them feel less than. Always. This job had given me so much pride in myself. I had done that! I had earned the career that I had always wanted. I was making enough money to live alone in a small home with two bedrooms. When I was offered the job, I spent so much time at my grocery store job telling the regular customers I had learned to love that I was going to be going somewhere else and feeling swollen with joy when they would congratulate me and sound impressed at my new position. It was so uplifting.

Just as I had felt myself lifting off the ground when I got this job, I felt my body crashing into the earth a few months later when I received a letter in the mail that my temporary furlough had become permanent. I wasn’t applying for jobs because I foolishly believed that I would have something to go back to in just a few more weeks when non-essential workers would be called back. Now what?

Months went by. The romantic relationship I had entered into just before the pandemic started was blossoming, but something in my heart was dying. I couldn’t stop crying and I was beginning to have graphic nightmares about being let go from my job. I had to grieve this loss while also applying to jobs I wasn’t really sure I wanted and taking interviews with potential employers that felt more terrifying than exciting. The pandemic was still new, and people weren’t so willing to hire. I didn’t quite have three years of experience in my field, and it was still difficult for me to talk about my previous job without getting a lump in my throat. Still, I applied to hundreds of jobs each week. I had interviews regularly but no one decided on me.

I have to be honest. The rejection hurt deeply. The worst experience I had, however, was with a man who scheduled an interview with me after I had officially been unemployed for 10 months. His company was focused on a content developer who could bring SEO experience to the table. I felt a little out of my element there since I hadn’t been in the SEO game in quite a while, but I thought that I would show how tenacious I was and how willing to play catch up I was by talking about my abilities and how quickly I had learned at my previous job. I had also been taking a class I thought was relevant to the position, so I mentioned that. Slowly the interview devolved into him talking to me carefully like I was incapable of doing the job and he knew it, and I began to feel pressured and overwhelmed. He had begun the interview casually but eventually got to the point where he was pointing out my weaknesses and insecurities in a very patronizing way. I could feel my throat closing and I desperately tried to tell him that I hadn’t been sure I was going to continue working in writing. I struggled to feel validated in my abilities after several rejections from other companies. I was grieving a job that I had loved and trying to pick up the pieces of a career I thought I would never get back. I knew I wasn’t as up-to-date on SEO practices as some of the other people he was probably interviewing, but I am a hard worker and a researcher and I would love to put in the time to be the best at the job. “Well, it’s a bit of a red flag,” he said, “that you haven’t had a job or really done anything in this time.”

Hadn’t done anything? I’d been taking classes and reading articles. I’d been helping my sister with the birth of her first baby. I’d been applying to hundreds of jobs a week and doing interviews every week and writing and trying to be strong for myself. I’d been falling in love. Most importantly to myself, I had been in mourning. I had been mourning the loss of something I had so concretely based my identity on for so long. Frankly, some days my best was pulling myself out of bed and eating something. Brushing my teeth. Making a phone call to my baby brother. Just when did we decide that work was the only thing “worth doing” in life?

For nearly two weeks after that interview, which ended with me blocking his email address to rule out any further contact potential, I couldn’t open my computer without bursting into tears. I was so scared that all the things he said were somehow true. Maybe I wasn’t a sophisticated writer or a person worth investing in. Maybe I wasn’t going to be good at a future job. Maybe I wasn’t good enough. Somehow, I pulled through. I am resilient like my father and I know how to keep my chin above water. Eventually, I could apply for jobs without crying. I started to believe in my skills again.

I want to acknowledge that I am very privileged and lucky during this pandemic, at a time where people all over the world are losing their homes and livelihoods. I have a family who loves me and supports me when things get tough. I have a wonderful partner who fills my days with endless joys. I have friends who I have only gotten closer to during this year of separation. I have food to eat every day, a bed to sleep in each night, and clean clothes. I have a shower with hot water and a television to watch movies on. I don’t have any pets or children, so everything I need to buy is for myself only. Bills are mine only, and luckily with all the unemployment extensions, I have been able to survive off this income for the time being. My life, at the base level, could be much, much worse. For that I am grateful.

However, I still have to give myself permission to grieve. It’s been over a year now since I lost my place at that company. I don’t have health insurance and I haven’t been to a dentist in 13 months. I’m exhausted all the time and stressed out often. I’m fully aware that the longer I am unemployed, the less likely it is that I will get a job in my field. I consider it a good day if I cry less than four times. Only in the last few months have I stopped punishing myself enough to start reading and creatively writing again. It has been an excruciatingly tough road. And yet, I still woke up this morning and I wrote this piece and I breathed. Oh, and yes, if you were curious- I did apply for more jobs today.

I have hope that things will get better for not only myself but for all of us. We have to come through this thing on the other side. For whatever you are grieving, or mourning, or just feeling deeply sad about, please remember you are not alone in that sorrow. The world weeps with you. Be compassionate and love yourself a little more today. If you can’t do it for yourself, please do it for me. Do it for the woman who is still waking up every day, trying her very best. It is hard, but we can get through it together.

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