A co-worker called to say he was sorry, sorry I got laid off. He also said it was stupid. Stupid indeed.
I am still sorting through my feelings about the whole incident. First off, it wasn’t handled well. As I wasn’t in the office, a manager, who was not even my boss, called to tell me. They didn’t even have the courtesy to tell me in person.
This manager had the uneviable position to be the bearer of bad news. He also said he was my friend and to let him know if I needed anything. I really can’t blame him. Initially I was very upset. Why? Why me? And what about all the extra work I had been doing – chipping in to lay out another paper. Didn’t that count for something? And what about the fact that I was more competent and had more longevity than some of the employees they retained? As you can see, that sorrow shortly turned to anger and even as soon as the next day, I began to grow more peaceful about the situation. Being laid-off, I was certainly better off than those left behind on the sinking ship with more duties i.e. someone had to do my work.
Yes I was better off. Afterall, I would be able to collect unemployment and I was through with a truly shitty company. One that just kept piling on more and more duties without compensation. It’s a newspaper company, so this is probably not much of a surprise. In addition to treating the employees like shit, the pay was even shittier. So I was done with them. I had wanted to leave for a long time and I was done. I received my wish. A neighbor said, “Things happen for a reason.” My reason was to get out of there and find a more worthwhile job – worthy of my time and talents.
Still what would I do? Well, initially I actually filled up the car with gas and went grocery shopping. As my husband said, “We still have to eat.” I took this as a good sign of my resilence – life goes on. Next, I would collect unemployment for six months (or more depending on the stimulus money in depressed states like Rhode Island). I would be home with my sons for spring and summer vacation – saving money we would have spent on summer camp. See money wasn’t so much the issue – it was more a question of what would I do?
Work gave me a purpose and somewhere to go each day. It would take time to sort out a new agenda and purpose while I was now a stay at home mom. I realized I felt like I had to be accomplishing something all the time and that was the first thing that had to go. I would try to exercise daily. I would re-connect with friends. I would regain some peace.
My husband said I was a happier person after day two of my lay off. Indeed, I felt happier and more in the moment.
I would try to write daily – at least one column a day – even if it never was going to be published. (That would be an adjustment, as I had no regular outlet for my writing - except I do now and it's called a blog). I would try to follow my joy and enjoy myself. I started making myself nice breakfasts and elaborate salads for lunch. I started watching less TV. I was getting more sleep.
Still there were looming questions like ‘How would it be this summer to be home with my three boys.’ It wouldn’t necessarily be all fun but my husband said, “It will be what you make it.” So true. And isn’t that true of life in general.
So for now, I am going to try not to worry about what I will do with myself come fall or come when my unemployment runs out. I am going to try to make the best of this and enjoy every minute. Of course, if I see a job that I am eligible for, I do apply.
And then after writing the above, new feelings started to creep in. My positivity turned to slight depression. The reality of being with the boys all day left little if any time for myself and little if any time for uninterrupted writing. And the reality of being home alone until they were out of school proved a little lonely. I know, I know most people would LOVE time to themselves.
The recently laid-off, self-described corporate executive with the six-figure income who was on the Oprah show said her self-esteem had suffered with the job loss. She obviously didn’t like being a stay at home mom with her three year old. Oprah and the Jewish counselor she had on told her she was more than her six figure income. Her husband also told her she was more. . . but I understand. Oh yes we can tell ourselves we are still wonderful, capable people but you lose part of your identity when you lose your job. It will definitely be harder to be confident in interviews without a job.
A job becomes part of who you are – but I know that’s ego. If you can feel good about yourself without a job, or a man, or things – that’s the trick.
Yes confidence issues surfacing as slight hopelessness started creeping in for me. What am I going to do? Especially come Fall when the kids are back in school. There’s also some doubt about doing performing in a job because I am not actively doing it currently.
I know I need to keep writing and in the meantime get some contract work or just a little work to keep me busy. Keep your fingers crossed.
And I did indeed realize I needed something to keep me busy. I wasn’t comfortable on the couple days I had to myself idling reading or lounging. So I started completing small household projects that had been bugging me but that I had no time or desire to complete before.
First off, I took on a project around our sliding glass door. We had a replacement installed almost a year before and the walls around the edge needed painting and the curtain rod above needed lowering. The curtains were hanging a few inches off the ground. Between the spackling, sanding, painting and drilling – I got it all done in about half a day (my 5 year-old was home) and it looked damn good. I was proud of myself and realized I didn’t have to burden my husband with all of the fix up chores.
Next task – caulking the tubs. It sounds easy but like a lot of these handyman-type task, it’s all about practice. I got all the old caulk up – but it took more time than expected. Later I discovered a handy little device available at Benny’s with the perfect angle to scrape the old caulk right out of the crevasse. After loading the canister of caulk in the caulking gun, I squeezed the trigger and couldn’t get it to budge. Yikes! I almost called my husband but decided that the ¾ left in the tube must have hardened up. Since I didn’t know whether it was the gun, the caulk or me I bought what looked like a giant toothpaste-size tube of caulk at Benny’s. The directions said to push the bead of caulk in front. Well again practice makes perfect and how many tubs have I ever caulked – none in recent memory. All in all, my caulking looked pretty amateurish but passable. When I wet my finger and ran it along the bead of caulk, I seemed to do more damage.
Even with the amateur results, I felt proud. Proud of my accomplishment. When you’ve worked at a newspaper, you are regular producing products each and every week. Even though I was calming down after a few weeks, I still felt I had to accomplish something and completing all the little projects around the house that were bothering me was one way to kill two birds with one stone.
After a few painting projects, perhaps I was getting a little cocky. I was thinking of renting a power washer and re-painting the deck.
---------
It’s definitely an adjustment – becoming a stay at home mom (again) after you are laid off. One of the biggest adjustments was being home with my 5-year-old. I pulled him mostly out of his daycare as summer was approaching and to save some of that money I was no longer making. After a day or two of being home with him I was thinking that might be money well spent.
You see, he was bored. Bored with me. Bored after the constant activity and friends at school. And there were no kids home. All kids his age (that I know) were in pre-school or school themselves. And since I had been working, I had lost connections with other stay at home moms.
Solutions: we started going to the library almost daily where there were other humans to interact with. We started going to the playgrounds to find other children. He would and did talk to anyone and everyone in his starved state for company. When a car pulled up to the playground, he said “I think that girl is on my soccer team.” And he told her mom that who explained the girl didn’t play soccer. Nice try or nice pick-up line. There were girls with blond hair on his team, but not that girl. It didn’t matter, he made the connection he was seeking.
After riding our bikes to the library/playground, we rode home and I realized we still had a good six hours until brothers and other children arrived home. Errands would kills some more time. We went to the paint store for paint. We went to the AAA office for maps where he asked the man behind the counter if he could have the stuffed SpongeBob sitting on the counter. No but he had Eric talking to him all about SpongeBob.
We were near the pet store and took a tour through to look at the fish and big parrot. We went in the Dollar Store.
I had certainly forgotten – what do you do with children all day? I would have to get more creative. Besides bike rides, tennis, baseball, swimming (the woman at his day care said I would be in the best shape of my life), I realized he even liked helping with simple household chores like unloading the dishwasher. I could get a lot done with a helper over the next few months.
The unemployment journal
I all went so smoothly at first. I applied for unemployment on-line and they mailed me forms to fill out with the information I had already provided on-line (very efficient). The office was very efficient about mailing things. And then it was on to the Tele-serve system. No problem. I called in an answered questions pressing 1 for yes and 2 for no, or was it 2 for yes and 1 for no? Anyway I answered a series of questions about whether I was looking for full-time work and whether I was working etc. Next thing I know a day or two later I had two week’s worth of unemployment payments deposited in my account. Easy as pie, right?
Wrong. While I was thinking this Tele-serve system was so great, I didn’t realize it was a pain in the backside. The first time I had called on a Sunday (smart). The second time I called on a Monday morning (stupid). Now I may never know if the system was legitimately broken down or whether it was just clogged with callers on a weekday, but I kept getting a message from a cheerful automated female voice that said the system was down and to please call back later. For the next two days, I called and called without success. Would I receive my payment that week? Only when I logged onto the website did I discover the hours – 12 a.m. Sunday to 7 a.m. Monday and 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. Monday thru Friday. Yikes.
Meanwhile, on the personal front it was all a bit of an adjustment – being home without any real deadlines to accomplish anything. Though I had my goals everyday. When I was home with my five-year-old at first it was a battle of wills. I had to re-establish my authority with him. On Monday, while I walked the dog he rode his bike. And as starved for human contact as he is when he is home with me, he met a woman on the bike trail walking her two dogs. We walked with her for a while and he was right – it was nice to talk to someone else. He proclaimed it the greatest bike ride ever. One goal when I was home with him or not was to exercise daily. Another goal was not to let him watch too much TV. So we began planting the garden – well really digging up weeds and such. I showed him the trowel and explained all the plants coming up aside from the strawberries were weeds. He knew he said but dug holes looking for ants instead. Later we went to the library where we had a little more contact with non-relatives.
I am still sorting through my feelings about the whole incident. First off, it wasn’t handled well. As I wasn’t in the office, a manager, who was not even my boss, called to tell me. They didn’t even have the courtesy to tell me in person.
This manager had the uneviable position to be the bearer of bad news. He also said he was my friend and to let him know if I needed anything. I really can’t blame him. Initially I was very upset. Why? Why me? And what about all the extra work I had been doing – chipping in to lay out another paper. Didn’t that count for something? And what about the fact that I was more competent and had more longevity than some of the employees they retained? As you can see, that sorrow shortly turned to anger and even as soon as the next day, I began to grow more peaceful about the situation. Being laid-off, I was certainly better off than those left behind on the sinking ship with more duties i.e. someone had to do my work.
Yes I was better off. Afterall, I would be able to collect unemployment and I was through with a truly shitty company. One that just kept piling on more and more duties without compensation. It’s a newspaper company, so this is probably not much of a surprise. In addition to treating the employees like shit, the pay was even shittier. So I was done with them. I had wanted to leave for a long time and I was done. I received my wish. A neighbor said, “Things happen for a reason.” My reason was to get out of there and find a more worthwhile job – worthy of my time and talents.
Still what would I do? Well, initially I actually filled up the car with gas and went grocery shopping. As my husband said, “We still have to eat.” I took this as a good sign of my resilence – life goes on. Next, I would collect unemployment for six months (or more depending on the stimulus money in depressed states like Rhode Island). I would be home with my sons for spring and summer vacation – saving money we would have spent on summer camp. See money wasn’t so much the issue – it was more a question of what would I do?
Work gave me a purpose and somewhere to go each day. It would take time to sort out a new agenda and purpose while I was now a stay at home mom. I realized I felt like I had to be accomplishing something all the time and that was the first thing that had to go. I would try to exercise daily. I would re-connect with friends. I would regain some peace.
My husband said I was a happier person after day two of my lay off. Indeed, I felt happier and more in the moment.
I would try to write daily – at least one column a day – even if it never was going to be published. (That would be an adjustment, as I had no regular outlet for my writing - except I do now and it's called a blog). I would try to follow my joy and enjoy myself. I started making myself nice breakfasts and elaborate salads for lunch. I started watching less TV. I was getting more sleep.
Still there were looming questions like ‘How would it be this summer to be home with my three boys.’ It wouldn’t necessarily be all fun but my husband said, “It will be what you make it.” So true. And isn’t that true of life in general.
So for now, I am going to try not to worry about what I will do with myself come fall or come when my unemployment runs out. I am going to try to make the best of this and enjoy every minute. Of course, if I see a job that I am eligible for, I do apply.
And then after writing the above, new feelings started to creep in. My positivity turned to slight depression. The reality of being with the boys all day left little if any time for myself and little if any time for uninterrupted writing. And the reality of being home alone until they were out of school proved a little lonely. I know, I know most people would LOVE time to themselves.
The recently laid-off, self-described corporate executive with the six-figure income who was on the Oprah show said her self-esteem had suffered with the job loss. She obviously didn’t like being a stay at home mom with her three year old. Oprah and the Jewish counselor she had on told her she was more than her six figure income. Her husband also told her she was more. . . but I understand. Oh yes we can tell ourselves we are still wonderful, capable people but you lose part of your identity when you lose your job. It will definitely be harder to be confident in interviews without a job.
A job becomes part of who you are – but I know that’s ego. If you can feel good about yourself without a job, or a man, or things – that’s the trick.
Yes confidence issues surfacing as slight hopelessness started creeping in for me. What am I going to do? Especially come Fall when the kids are back in school. There’s also some doubt about doing performing in a job because I am not actively doing it currently.
I know I need to keep writing and in the meantime get some contract work or just a little work to keep me busy. Keep your fingers crossed.
And I did indeed realize I needed something to keep me busy. I wasn’t comfortable on the couple days I had to myself idling reading or lounging. So I started completing small household projects that had been bugging me but that I had no time or desire to complete before.
First off, I took on a project around our sliding glass door. We had a replacement installed almost a year before and the walls around the edge needed painting and the curtain rod above needed lowering. The curtains were hanging a few inches off the ground. Between the spackling, sanding, painting and drilling – I got it all done in about half a day (my 5 year-old was home) and it looked damn good. I was proud of myself and realized I didn’t have to burden my husband with all of the fix up chores.
Next task – caulking the tubs. It sounds easy but like a lot of these handyman-type task, it’s all about practice. I got all the old caulk up – but it took more time than expected. Later I discovered a handy little device available at Benny’s with the perfect angle to scrape the old caulk right out of the crevasse. After loading the canister of caulk in the caulking gun, I squeezed the trigger and couldn’t get it to budge. Yikes! I almost called my husband but decided that the ¾ left in the tube must have hardened up. Since I didn’t know whether it was the gun, the caulk or me I bought what looked like a giant toothpaste-size tube of caulk at Benny’s. The directions said to push the bead of caulk in front. Well again practice makes perfect and how many tubs have I ever caulked – none in recent memory. All in all, my caulking looked pretty amateurish but passable. When I wet my finger and ran it along the bead of caulk, I seemed to do more damage.
Even with the amateur results, I felt proud. Proud of my accomplishment. When you’ve worked at a newspaper, you are regular producing products each and every week. Even though I was calming down after a few weeks, I still felt I had to accomplish something and completing all the little projects around the house that were bothering me was one way to kill two birds with one stone.
After a few painting projects, perhaps I was getting a little cocky. I was thinking of renting a power washer and re-painting the deck.
---------
It’s definitely an adjustment – becoming a stay at home mom (again) after you are laid off. One of the biggest adjustments was being home with my 5-year-old. I pulled him mostly out of his daycare as summer was approaching and to save some of that money I was no longer making. After a day or two of being home with him I was thinking that might be money well spent.
You see, he was bored. Bored with me. Bored after the constant activity and friends at school. And there were no kids home. All kids his age (that I know) were in pre-school or school themselves. And since I had been working, I had lost connections with other stay at home moms.
Solutions: we started going to the library almost daily where there were other humans to interact with. We started going to the playgrounds to find other children. He would and did talk to anyone and everyone in his starved state for company. When a car pulled up to the playground, he said “I think that girl is on my soccer team.” And he told her mom that who explained the girl didn’t play soccer. Nice try or nice pick-up line. There were girls with blond hair on his team, but not that girl. It didn’t matter, he made the connection he was seeking.
After riding our bikes to the library/playground, we rode home and I realized we still had a good six hours until brothers and other children arrived home. Errands would kills some more time. We went to the paint store for paint. We went to the AAA office for maps where he asked the man behind the counter if he could have the stuffed SpongeBob sitting on the counter. No but he had Eric talking to him all about SpongeBob.
We were near the pet store and took a tour through to look at the fish and big parrot. We went in the Dollar Store.
I had certainly forgotten – what do you do with children all day? I would have to get more creative. Besides bike rides, tennis, baseball, swimming (the woman at his day care said I would be in the best shape of my life), I realized he even liked helping with simple household chores like unloading the dishwasher. I could get a lot done with a helper over the next few months.
The unemployment journal
I all went so smoothly at first. I applied for unemployment on-line and they mailed me forms to fill out with the information I had already provided on-line (very efficient). The office was very efficient about mailing things. And then it was on to the Tele-serve system. No problem. I called in an answered questions pressing 1 for yes and 2 for no, or was it 2 for yes and 1 for no? Anyway I answered a series of questions about whether I was looking for full-time work and whether I was working etc. Next thing I know a day or two later I had two week’s worth of unemployment payments deposited in my account. Easy as pie, right?
Wrong. While I was thinking this Tele-serve system was so great, I didn’t realize it was a pain in the backside. The first time I had called on a Sunday (smart). The second time I called on a Monday morning (stupid). Now I may never know if the system was legitimately broken down or whether it was just clogged with callers on a weekday, but I kept getting a message from a cheerful automated female voice that said the system was down and to please call back later. For the next two days, I called and called without success. Would I receive my payment that week? Only when I logged onto the website did I discover the hours – 12 a.m. Sunday to 7 a.m. Monday and 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. Monday thru Friday. Yikes.
Meanwhile, on the personal front it was all a bit of an adjustment – being home without any real deadlines to accomplish anything. Though I had my goals everyday. When I was home with my five-year-old at first it was a battle of wills. I had to re-establish my authority with him. On Monday, while I walked the dog he rode his bike. And as starved for human contact as he is when he is home with me, he met a woman on the bike trail walking her two dogs. We walked with her for a while and he was right – it was nice to talk to someone else. He proclaimed it the greatest bike ride ever. One goal when I was home with him or not was to exercise daily. Another goal was not to let him watch too much TV. So we began planting the garden – well really digging up weeds and such. I showed him the trowel and explained all the plants coming up aside from the strawberries were weeds. He knew he said but dug holes looking for ants instead. Later we went to the library where we had a little more contact with non-relatives.
Good luck with the blog, Galen. You've started well.
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