What is Your Employment Situation?

[Martina]

teacher here. my last line of work before retirement, I hope. there were several before this. Anyway, it's so so much fun part of the time. But when it's not, it is a huge amount of work in conditions that are insulting to one's dignity and sometimes heartbreakingly sad.

But there's that fun. Not too many jobs are fun and meaningful. Still most days it's a toss up as to whether I made the right decision. Some it's "Why did I ever get into this profession?"

My mom and dad are both retired teachers. They both said, "DON'T DO IT!" I do not think I made the wrong decision, but seven years in, I now know what they meant.

[ArkansasPiscesGrrl]

Self employed business owner. I do medical billing & collections, utilization review, and managed care contracting. I specialize with Behavioral Health treatment facilities (drug & alcohol treatment, eating disorder treatment, etc)

I actually might be looking for someone to help me with the UR work, if you are experienced. You can even work from home!

APG

[CherylNYC]

I'm a freelance sculptor/scenic artist. I make sculptural scenery for theatre, film and TV. You can often find me on a ladder or scaffolding cutting up huge chunks of styrofoam with my sawzall while dressed in clothing horribly encrusted with layers of paint and plaster. I usually work no more than a few weeks or months on a typical assignment, and I sometimes only work on a particular job for a day or two. That works out very well for someone as cantankerous as I can be because it keeps me from getting overly annoyed by irritating people. I also have the freedom to decide when and how much time to take off work, which suits me well. I get paid when I work, and I don't get paid when I go on vacation. Easy-peasy. That said, it's a feast-or-famine business, but I don't have a huge mortgage or children to support, so the dry times don't usually concern me very deeply. We often work very loooong hours. A typical day on a movie is 10 hours long before they start throwing emergency scenery at us, and the giant sculptural work in which I specialize is quite physically demanding. Younger artists are typically the most enthusiastic about those long hours, but most of them still can't keep up with me. (I just turned 50!!! YAY!)

I'm a member of a small union, (it's more like an artisan's guild than a traditional union, and our officers are scrupulously honest), so I get the best of both worlds. The union negotiates and enforces our contracts so I don't have to worry about getting stiffed by an employer. Through my union I have decent medical insurance, a 401k, and I'm accruing pension benefits, plus I'm eligible for unemployment benefits when there's no work.

Even though it's not my own art, I make a decent living as a sculptor in NYC. I'm very good at what I do, and my coworkers, (an odd cast of rotating characters, many of whom have known me and each other for decades), deeply respect me and my skills. I feel very lucky.

[*Anya*]

I am so fortunate that I am an RN. It has served me so well through thick and thin.

I wanted to be a nurse from the time I was little but after I was left with a 6-month old and a 2-year old by their deadbeat dad, I knew it was the best choice I had to be able to support them. I spent a few years on welfare, doing all the prerequisites, got into nursing school, earned my nursing, bachelors degree and never looked back.

Right now I am struggling with whether or not to accept a job offer I just got yesterday. It is for way more money but also way more work. It is a management position. I am so torn. My current job has less stress, is closer to my home but there is no opportunity for advancement. I was willing to settle.

Out of the blue came a recruiter and this company that recognizes my worth, my skill set and value. Did I mention, a ton more work? I swore I would never get back into management again! The politics make me cringe but there is no escaping politics anywhere these days, in any organization.

I wish I did not have to make this decision now. I was not looking for a move. I am still not 100% from my surgeries as well as dealing with matters of the heart.

I know so many people on the Planet and in the USA are looking for work. I am grateful to be in the position of being employed. I do know how fortunate I am.

[starryeyes]

100% self employed freelance sign language interpreter. Which has it perks, but is VERY slow during the summer!! Picking up now tho!! Yayaya!

:-)

[girl_dee]

Currently:

Certified Reflexologist working at a Massage/Lymphedema clinic seeing clients 2 days a week. Reflexology is based on the science that the 7,200 nerve endings and countless reflexes in each foot correspond to the different parts of the body, and by stimulating them you can bring circulation and healing to the client. It's an amazing modality. (Low hours high pay job)

Also Domestic Goddess and House wench at Syr's farm. i now make jams/jellies to sell and create crochet odds and ends to sell. (low to no pay stuff)

Then there is my photography, i try to sell prints when i can, and still tiptoeing into shooting live people. (it cost me basically to do this lol)


Formerly: banking officer , owner of legal courier service, clean air technician, Activities Director at a head injury unit and Oregon Campground Resort store clerk/dishwasher/prep-cook/ice-creamservertocutelilkids/lake bum ( <-- fun as hell but hard work,long hours,sell your soul, no pay job... )

i've been everywhere, Man.

[The JD]

I'm a microbiologist. It started as a part time position 21 years ago... back then, I wanted to be a rock star (quit laughing, I'm serious), and was looking for a part time position that would supplement the (lack of) income from my every-weekend touring and gigging schedule. But then the band broke up, and my supplementary part time position became a permanent full-time position. I'm pretty sure my mom was turning cart-wheels in her front yard that day.

I did go back to get a masters in my field, but nothing beats on-the-job experience. I've recently noticed I'm the go-to person in the lab- when others are having problems identifying or isolating an organism, I'm the the one called in to help. It seems I've picked up a hell of a lot of obscure-yet-practical knowledge while I was eking out my own way in a field I didn't mean to enter.

[*Anya*]

I did accept the new job. It is very scary to take a plunge into the unknown. I like security, familiarity and ease in a job. I like the people that I have worked with, with few exceptions. It is hard to leave those good folks.

Yet, I did take the plunge. Yesterday I spent packing up my office (well, cubicle) and it made me cry. Very sad to leave for the unknown. I worry that it was not the right time due to my age, recent recovery, the impending workload, yada, yada and that I could obsesses about 199 more things. If I let myself, that is.

On the other hand, it is exciting, a wonderful professional opportunity that I am grateful to have and my life is good right now. I am going to work on changing my customary glass half empty view of life to gee, that glass is more than half full!

Life is just too short not to look at it that way.

[RNguy]

Originally Posted by *Anya*

I am so fortunate that I am an RN. It has served me so well through thick and thin.

I wanted to be a nurse from the time I was little but after I was left with a 6-month old and a 2-year old by their deadbeat dad, I knew it was the best choice I had to be able to support them. I spent a few years on welfare, doing all the prerequisites, got into nursing school, earned my nursing, bachelors degree and never looked back.

Right now I am struggling with whether or not to accept a job offer I just got yesterday. It is for way more money but also way more work. It is a management position. I am so torn. My current job has less stress, is closer to my home but there is no opportunity for advancement. I was willing to settle.

Out of the blue came a recruiter and this company that recognizes my worth, my skill set and value. Did I mention, a ton more work? I swore I would never get back into management again! The politics make me cringe but there is no escaping politics anywhere these days, in any organization.

I wish I did not have to make this decision now. I was not looking for a move. I am still not 100% from my surgeries as well as dealing with matters of the heart.

I know so many people on the Planet and in the USA are looking for work. I am grateful to be in the position of being employed. I do know how fortunate I am.

Sis o mine thank you for sharing this little bit you shared .
I don't divulge much about my life , in all honesty two people know every detail of my life and one of those people is no longer alive .
I started working at 10 mowing yards in my neighborhood .
There was a point in my life barely 21 where I was homeless. I worked two minimum wage jobs , many hours and instead of paying rent , it went towards college books , school supplies and food. I showered at friends places and crashed on some couches in the winter months and slept in my car in the park during warmer weather .
Nobody in my classes knew my personal life and I'm a proud person and hate help. I've never taken a cent from anyone nor ever asked for grants or loans .
I was in lab tech school at this point and was doing clinicals at a hospital ( who ended up hiring me ) . I realized on the old side of this hospital there were two floors that were empty of pts and they had it closed . The rooms still had outdated beds but the rooms also had a bathroom and shower with running water . I asked some lab folks about the two empty floors and they said that they have been closed for many years and used for storage .
I thought hmmmm I wonder if anyone would even know if I slept there and so I did . I lived there unnoticed for 13 months til one day a nun opened the door and was shocked . This is a Catholic hospital who at the time the nuns ran the place . I was scared to death expecting the worse outcome . She sat on the bed and talked to me for over an hour about a lot of things .
She told me that I was welcome and if anyone ever said anything to me or caught me to have them speak directly to her . she said after I graduate lab tech school to find her and she would get me an interview however to be very quiet and dont tell anyone what I was doing about staying there . I said ok. I graduated, took my board test and was hired there in the lab everyone has hard times and no matter how hard they get , it always works itself out .

[*Anya*]

Originally Posted by *Anya*

August, 2012

I am so fortunate that I am an RN. It has served me so well through thick and thin.

Right now I am struggling with whether or not to accept a job offer I just got yesterday. It is for way more money but also way more work. It is a management position. I am so torn. My current job has less stress, is closer to my home but there is no opportunity for advancement. I was willing to settle.

Did I mention, a ton more work? I swore I would never get back into management again! The politics make me cringe but there is no escaping politics anywhere these days, in any organization.

I should have read my own post 10 times before accepting the job I wrote about here.

It has turned out to be exactly the red flags that I ignored.

Can't say I have ever disliked a job more or had a more stressful job.

I just accepted an offer to do outpatient counseling again which has always been my first love.

Pay less? Check. Less responsibility? Check. 10 minutes on no freeways from my girl-friend's house (where I basically live now)? Check.

I have never stayed at a job for just a little over a year before but I know that it is the right choice for me. If I stay at my current job, I will lose it. Yes, it is that bad.

I gave notice yesterday and will take a week off before I start my new job.

I know how lucky I am that I had a choice

[Okiebug61]

Still hanging in as commission only sales. Red is only 6yrs from being able to retire from teaching. We are looking at moving to the coast soon after that.

[PoeticSilence]

Recently disabled after working nineteen years at a job I LOVED. Despite their "stay in the closet" attitude for gays, and the high levels of stress, and the impossible expectations.

If you boil it down, I was doing collections work. Asset Recovery. But I loved the job, and my company despite its flaws and many of the peoples attitudes. The fact that my company was willing to work with my disabilities to keep me, and I do mean work, because they would have had to make a lot of exceptions, was something that nearly broke my heart. After everything I'd been through and experienced there, all the bad and the good. They changed me in a lot of ways, and I know I changed many of them. Four months later and I still get managers that email me to see how I'm doing. In the nineteen years I worked there, when I left, there was only one person in my whole area that had been there as long as I had, we went through over eighty people in that time because of different reasons, but mainly because the place is stressful.

I wish I could do it all over again, or better yet, be well enough to go on. I love a good challenge and that job challenged me nearly every day. Maybe I thrived on the stress, but doubtful, since a lot of my illness has to do with stress-related illnesses. I feared losing my job (a realistic concern) almost every day but I was so happy when Monday came along so that I could go back to work.

Being disabled is so much more difficult than working, I'm going to have to learn how to not be at work. I identify with work as being a sign of respect and reliability...

[not2shygrrl]

I work full time M-F with an early start time! 40 hours and I am done with no opportunity for overtime. I am lucky and fortunate to be working.