Feeling lost career wise at 40

[Anonymous]

OP, may think you are a 'failure' career-wise. Let me tell you, I would love to be in your shoes. You really have the best of both worlds. Keep the PT job you love. Enjoy your time with your kid, become involved in the school, do activities together. Don't worry about having a fufulling career, have a fulfilling LIFE!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let's all be honest here. Either because of lifetime ADD or depression, OP has never really done *anything*. She flits from thing to thing every year or so. All of us who have had longer term careers know that it takes a lot more effort to stick out a job 5-10 years than it does to do what OP has done for the last 20 years:

- 18-22: college
- 23-26: JD
- 3-4 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive sort of legal-related jobs for $40k
- 2 (?) years of doing a masters in special ed
- 2-3 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive education related jobs for $40k
- 5 years of staying home with a kid, who for the last several years has likely been in preschool. OP didn't mention anything about even doing volunteering during this time.

OP is a classic non-committed job jumper who has been enabled by her parents and husband. She has never had to pay a single bill on her own salary. She isn't going to magically turn into someone who can commit to a job, or even a volunteer role, for more than a year.

I'm usually hardcore of the position that dads need to get a grip and spend more time dealing with shit at home in order for their wives to have satisfying careers. But I agree with the person above who said that OP has been essentially doing nothing for 20 years, her DH has been paying all the bills and working hard, and now OP is going to demand that DH starts chipping in more around the house and take time off work so she can flit around other low-paying jobs for the next 5 years solely to satiate her midlife crisis? If I were the husband, I would be peeved.

OP - the best you can ask for is to keep up with your PT job and/or do some volunteering at your kid's school.

You are incredibly rude and condescending.

And a poor reader. The OP volunteers part time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, I suggest taking a STC job at the World Bank. The positions are often part-time and can lead to more meaningful careers in international development or non-profits. You will need to network to find the right TTL who is hiring, but your law degree will be a plus.

Oh right, because anyone with little experience who's been unemployed for the last 5 years can just hop into World Bank consulting? 90% of those jobs are extremely competitive unless you're talking about admin work or really undesirable work.

I doubt you actually work there. I do, and I suggested this. It is more than doable because my team hires people just like OP to work 1-2 days each week.

So any chance they would hire a PhD in economics! How to find these jobs please share.

Yes, please share how best to go about finding these jobs ... sounds like they could be the jackpot for all of us former lawyers who want some intellectual stimulation and adult contact but who can't commit to 40+ hours a week for whatever reason ...

I am 100% willing to commit to 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 hours a week. I took 5 years off and now have been working as a contract lawyer making nothing working 60 hours a week (for the overtime pay) for over a year, so I know I could do it. The idea that I could work at the World Bank thrills me...

OR any place with intellectual stimulation for that matter - document review is far from it! But, doing it for a year proves that I can balance family and work easily (I wouldn't have left my job in the first place but my husband's job took us abroad for a couple years and then I got pregnant so postponed starting back up).

[Anonymous]

Could you be a legal secretary or paralegal?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, may think you are a 'failure' career-wise. Let me tell you, I would love to be in your shoes. You really have the best of both worlds. Keep the PT job you love. Enjoy your time with your kid, become involved in the school, do activities together. Don't worry about having a fufulling career, have a fulfilling LIFE!

This is good advice. OP, if you weren't worried about "wasting your potential" if you'd had the family you envisioned, why should that be any different now that you will have only one child? If you really want to do something intellectual, find a great volunteer opportunity. If you want it to be in the legal field, consider a legal aid group -- even without a license (I think you said you didn't take the bar) you could do intake/paralegal work that would be very meaningful. You could really make a difference in people's lives. A lot of full-time paid careers don't make such a difference. I work 45 hours a week as a government lawyer and I love my job, but I don't kid myself that I'm improving lives here. I'm not. I enjoy it on an intellectual level and the position exists and someone's gonna fill it, so it might as well be me. In terms of making a mark on the world, my pro bono work has had far more of an impact on individual lives than anything I will ever do in my regular capacity. Since you don't have to worry about the money, why not give something like that a try?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can relate to a lot of your post, OP. I too have a JD and have inattentive ADD. Certain things happened in my marriage which were really disappointing, and a dealt with this by focusing on my own path, which included changing careers. While I did practice for a while I changed career tracks at age 40, returning to school for a counseling degree. I'm now a therapist and love it. If teaching or counseling is your thing I say do it! I'm 55 now and don't regret the career shift for a second -- I love what I do.

OP here. Thanks for sharing your story. I didn't know I had inattantive ADD until a few years ago but it explains a lot. I'm totally fine re: ADD when I'm a SAHM/only work very part-time, but when I work full-time I can't juggle work and home responsibilities very well and feel overwhelmed. I'm not forgetful/don't lose things/am always punctual but my ADD manifests itself mainly in feeling overwhelmed. I also have difficulty with boring tasks and keeping attention focused on boring tasks. I had a lot of difficulty studying but managed to get good grades. Anyhow, now that I'm aware of my ADD I can make use of coping skills which are very helpful and work well.

Anyhow, I don't think I want to go back to school for a third degree, but I'd like to make use of the JD and/or master's in teaching if possible. I preferred the school counseling focus I was doing over teaching.

Shit, if this is what it means to have ADD then I have it!

[Anonymous]

OP, I'm so sorry about the secondary infertility. And I get where you're coming from. I hope you're still reading.

I had a few ideas based on what you've written. First, check out a book on midlife called Life Reimagined that came out recently. It has a great chapter on work and how hard it can be to jump into something new, and how to make it easier.

Second--and I apologize because this is not paid work which I know is what you want, but somehow reading your posts you seem suited to it-- I wonder if you would consider working as a volunteer in the foster care system, specifically as a court appointed special advocate (CASA). These are desperately needed and could blend your experience with kids and law. Anyway, it just popped into my head.

I think you would benefit from meeting with a good career coach. That could help you prioritize sometimes conflicting issues, like whether to get a 10-3 job (very very difficult and it may not be fulfilling), or whether to aim for a fulfilling career with longer hours. And a career coach might help you crystallize what you really want to do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can relate to a lot of your post, OP. I too have a JD and have inattentive ADD. Certain things happened in my marriage which were really disappointing, and a dealt with this by focusing on my own path, which included changing careers. While I did practice for a while I changed career tracks at age 40, returning to school for a counseling degree. I'm now a therapist and love it. If teaching or counseling is your thing I say do it! I'm 55 now and don't regret the career shift for a second -- I love what I do.

OP here. Thanks for sharing your story. I didn't know I had inattantive ADD until a few years ago but it explains a lot. I'm totally fine re: ADD when I'm a SAHM/only work very part-time, but when I work full-time I can't juggle work and home responsibilities very well and feel overwhelmed. I'm not forgetful/don't lose things/am always punctual but my ADD manifests itself mainly in feeling overwhelmed. I also have difficulty with boring tasks and keeping attention focused on boring tasks. I had a lot of difficulty studying but managed to get good grades. Anyhow, now that I'm aware of my ADD I can make use of coping skills which are very helpful and work well.

Anyhow, I don't think I want to go back to school for a third degree, but I'd like to make use of the JD and/or master's in teaching if possible. I preferred the school counseling focus I was doing over teaching.

Shit, if this is what it means to have ADD then I have it!

Me too, so does that mean we get special accommodations

OP, I would be careful complaining about how hard things are b/c of your sham "ADD" diagnosis -- I really am curious how your husband feels about all this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let's all be honest here. Either because of lifetime ADD or depression, OP has never really done *anything*. She flits from thing to thing every year or so. All of us who have had longer term careers know that it takes a lot more effort to stick out a job 5-10 years than it does to do what OP has done for the last 20 years:

- 18-22: college
- 23-26: JD
- 3-4 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive sort of legal-related jobs for $40k
- 2 (?) years of doing a masters in special ed
- 2-3 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive education related jobs for $40k
- 5 years of staying home with a kid, who for the last several years has likely been in preschool. OP didn't mention anything about even doing volunteering during this time.

OP is a classic non-committed job jumper who has been enabled by her parents and husband. She has never had to pay a single bill on her own salary. She isn't going to magically turn into someone who can commit to a job, or even a volunteer role, for more than a year.

I'm usually hardcore of the position that dads need to get a grip and spend more time dealing with shit at home in order for their wives to have satisfying careers. But I agree with the person above who said that OP has been essentially doing nothing for 20 years, her DH has been paying all the bills and working hard, and now OP is going to demand that DH starts chipping in more around the house and take time off work so she can flit around other low-paying jobs for the next 5 years solely to satiate her midlife crisis? If I were the husband, I would be peeved.

OP - the best you can ask for is to keep up with your PT job and/or do some volunteering at your kid's school.

You are incredibly rude and condescending.

And a poor reader. The OP volunteers part time.

Come ON. We all know she's talking about an hour a month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Let's all be honest here. Either because of lifetime ADD or depression, OP has never really done *anything*. She flits from thing to thing every year or so. All of us who have had longer term careers know that it takes a lot more effort to stick out a job 5-10 years than it does to do what OP has done for the last 20 years:

- 18-22: college
- 23-26: JD
- 3-4 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive sort of legal-related jobs for $40k
- 2 (?) years of doing a masters in special ed
- 2-3 years of jumping around low paying non-competitive education related jobs for $40k
- 5 years of staying home with a kid, who for the last several years has likely been in preschool. OP didn't mention anything about even doing volunteering during this time.

OP is a classic non-committed job jumper who has been enabled by her parents and husband. She has never had to pay a single bill on her own salary. She isn't going to magically turn into someone who can commit to a job, or even a volunteer role, for more than a year.

I'm usually hardcore of the position that dads need to get a grip and spend more time dealing with shit at home in order for their wives to have satisfying careers. But I agree with the person above who said that OP has been essentially doing nothing for 20 years, her DH has been paying all the bills and working hard, and now OP is going to demand that DH starts chipping in more around the house and take time off work so she can flit around other low-paying jobs for the next 5 years solely to satiate her midlife crisis? If I were the husband, I would be peeved.

OP - the best you can ask for is to keep up with your PT job and/or do some volunteering at your kid's school.

You are incredibly rude and condescending.

And a poor reader. The OP volunteers part time.

Np here. I just went through thread. At no point did OP mention she volunteers. At all. I suspect as having ADD she probably finds getting house in order and managing kid challenging enough. Kid is only in school 6 hours -- unless she was organized it would be hard to make volunteer efforts work on that short time.

[Anonymous]

We all can't have everything in life. You've had a cushy situation for 20+ years and you never invested in yourself. Unfortunately you've traveled this far down this road, that you are right, you've wasted any sort of intellectual capacity. It's very sad that you are thinking back to grade school and high school academics as your glory days. I think it's time to accept that 20 years are gone and start making some good choices and investing in yourself. That means your partner will have to also shift his thinking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. My child and my friends kids are all between ages 3-4, so many of them haven't dealt with before/after care or camps yet because like I said, everyone I know who works full-time either has an au pair (majority of families), one spouse works from home and can cover, or they have local grandparents who babysits/nannies regularly. So they aren't scrambling to find coverage for sick/snow days or summers as much. The logistics of figuring all this out do seem incredibly overwhelming since spouse's job is 100% inflexible so it all falls on me. So far it's been easy because any sick/snow days and all summer is just me, spouse has never taken any time off for any of these situations. It's challenging to try to figure out how I would get all that time covered, especially since new jobs usually have limited vacation time.

But the logistics aside, my question is more of what can I do with my degrees and my limited work experience. I preferred the school counseling aspect of my job to teaching. I can try to find sub jobs as a first step to getting back into things but I want to explore what else I could possibly do with a JD and a master's in special education. I'm having difficulty envisioning job possiblities for myself. I guess having an actual career is probbably not realistic at this point.

Thanks!

Do you need the money or you just want to be doing something out of the house? If the latter, why not keep the part-time job you have, which at least pays something, and then volunteer at one or two organizations that are meaningful to you? Keep the hours reasonable so you can still pick up your child and not have to do after care and all that stuff. I mean it sounds like you enjoy being a SAHM, and nothing wrong with that, so why not preserve more of it by working fewer hours. If you embark on a "career," you will lose that time with your child. And I say this as a full-time working mother who loves her career and her kids. But having a career is not for everyone. A job is plenty for many people. Unless you feel a strong push to have a career as opposed to a job -- and it seems like you haven't up until now -- why not just allocate your time a bit differently so you get to spend a ton of time with your child, have some time for you, work at a job you love, do some volunteering, pursue hobbies -- etc. Many people would kill for a setup like that.

OP here. We don't need my salary. The issue is that I feel like I have wasted my potential, and this bothers me every single day. I am happy that I was able to find a job that worked for my schedule as a SAHM, and I have done very well in this job and receive great performance reviews, and I would get a great reference from this job. But I want something more intellectually. I was a smart girl in high school and college, and also did well in law school but never was able to find a good career fit.

Wow you weren't kidding. It's like Al from Married With Children reliving their quarterback glory days in high school. At least OP didn't have to have their money worries nor sell shoes!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We all can't have everything in life. You've had a cushy situation for 20+ years and you never invested in yourself. Unfortunately you've traveled this far down this road, that you are right, you've wasted any sort of intellectual capacity. It's very sad that you are thinking back to grade school and high school academics as your glory days. I think it's time to accept that 20 years are gone and start making some good choices and investing in yourself. That means your partner will have to also shift his thinking.

Exactly.

[Anonymous]

OP maybe try helping adults with resumes, writing skills, tutoring etc?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We all can't have everything in life. You've had a cushy situation for 20+ years and you never invested in yourself. Unfortunately you've traveled this far down this road, that you are right, you've wasted any sort of intellectual capacity. It's very sad that you are thinking back to grade school and high school academics as your glory days. I think it's time to accept that 20 years are gone and start making some good choices and investing in yourself. That means your partner will have to also shift his thinking.

Exactly.

OP here. This thread is one of the most mean spirited I have ever read on DCUM. Here I am recovering from my hysterectomy (which means I will never be able to have more children) which I am absolutely heartbroken about, and then I read the positively nasty comments on here when I am already at my lowest point between the hysterectomy and feeling like I'm in the middle of a midlife crisis trying to figure out a roadmap for my 40s. Newsflash: SAH and taking care of a child and a home/husband is not a waste at all. Over the past few years I have spent every minute with my child, seen every milestone, and made my home a nicer place for my family by taking care of all the housework and cooking myself. Congratulations, you have all made a heartbroken, depressed women feel even more depressed. I have never felt more depressed in my life than I have recently, and all you mean and nasty women have just made it a million times worse.