Reply to I'm 40 and I make $20 per hour

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here.  I have a problem with my job/career path/lack of career/low pay.  I don't really care what others think about it.  I feel like I wasted my master's degree but the problem is that I'm not that interested in the subject of my master's degree field anymore.  If I could be back in college again I'd pursue an allied health career--physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, etc. and start my own practice.  Wish I could pursue that path now but I can't uproot us for a new grad degree.[/quote]

NP here. I could have written a lot of what OP said and I'm also in my 40s struggling with finding a solid job after staying home with small children for a few years. I've also been working part-time, taking on freelance positions that pay around $20/hour, or less.

I think a big factor in what happens to your career certainly is your line of work. The SAHMs I've met who have returned to work without a catch work in a field that requires some kind of state certificate or license. As OP mentioned, the allied health fields, i.e. PT, OT, speech. Also, of course, medicine. Or K-12 teaching. They're not perfect paths, but unlike other fields, your career path is more or less solid and you can go part-time if need be if you have your own practice by age 35-40, or leave the field for a few years (some school districts around the country will hold a teacher's job if they take a leave of absence). And, there is and will always be a need for specialists in the allied health fields. With the aging babyboomers, you'll more or less be set employment-wise if you're an OT.

I majored in a liberal arts field and experienced layoffs and companies shutting down or merging. Would I have found myself collecting unemployment ten years ago if I had been working as teacher or physical therapist? Probably not. I made my bed, as the saying goes. Now, at 40+, I'm trying to find ways to continue using my degrees and have had to settle for part-time, lower-paying online work due to the state of things in my life. Sure, I coulda, shoulda. I'd love to go back to school but there are other expenses to worry about at this point. The one thing that scares me when I see older women in their 50s, 60s, working at a department store. I highly doubt all of them are just divorcees who have to make end's meet. I bet a lot of them are educated professionals in their 50s who simply have a better chance of being hit by a car than hired. [/quote]

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