At this point, I’m “tapped out” of personal stories on people who have been long-term jobless to share with you.
But that doesn’t mean there aren’t more out there like I’ve been sharing with you since Sunday. There are way too many stories out there, they just haven’t been brought to my attention … yet.
In fact, just before I started writing this at just before 10 a.m. MST to meet my daily 10:30 a.m. personal blog “deadline” (which I have now missed anyway because of talking some things over with my lovely wife — she always gives me a hard time when I call her “lovely” in here) I sent an online message to a relatively new friend named Alan from Nevada, who has a pretty compelling story himself that I hope to get to you very soon. He’s just mulling over photos and song ideas to share at this point. But his story is coming.
In the meantime, I am strongly urging ANYONE from ANYWHERE, whether it’s in the U.S. or Canada or the United Kingdom or Norway, who knows someone going through this struggle with joblessness — long-term or short-term, either term is hard — and trying to survive and stay positive at the same time to write to me, either here in a comment in this blog or send me a message on Facebook here.
Sometimes, it just helps those who are jobless to pour out their feelings.
My struggle goes on, day by day. I could tell my feelings about turning in two forms to cancel our life insurance coverage just this week so we can save money on monthly premium payments. I guess I won’t be killing myself now and making it look like an accident out of sheer desperation, will I? I shouldn’t joke about that, but on the other hand you should know that I’m not filled with despair.
I can tell you about going into the employment office on Tuesday for a Re-employment Eligibility Assessment (REA) meeting with a counselor and coming up with a plan to get myself working again, getting whatever assistance we can for health and dental coverage for my wife and I and getting our 12-year-old daughter on the CHIP program so she’s covered, but my two sons who were covered just weeks ago on my former employer’s health insurance plan are now totally on their own because they’re over 18 so they’d damn well better not get sick!
On a side note, the employment counselor I worked with was very pleasant and helpful. As a word of advice from a “customer,” though, the people who you first meet inside the door to help direct you to where you need to go could be a bit more on the cheerier, friendlier side. What is it about dealing with the unemployed? Does seeing these people every day make those who deal with them every day a bit more surly? At least a hint of a smile and a warm “hello” would be nice.
I can tell you of my frustration about having a car that suddenly won’t start, and I just determined it may not be a simple case of a dead battery that I can fix myself and I’m wondering when I’ll be able to take it in to my ever-trusted and ever-honest mechanic to get worked on, more $$$ signs floating around in my head … yada, yada, yada.
Yeah, those kinds of feelings. Those are the kinds of feelings people need to know about who aren’t living through it themselves.
We’re not looking for sympathy. We’re not looking for hand-outs. We’re not looking for some “miracle monetary gift” showing up at our door to get us through. We want to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. That’s the American way, and we believe in that with all of our hearts.
All we want is for the American playing field to be more fair.
When it comes to that, I still haven’t found what I’m looking for. But I’ll keep looking. I’ll keep pushing.
A View From The Middle (Class) 
Hi John! Thanks for helping us with potluck tables tonight! Nick and I had a period where he was unemployed and things were tough, you can ask him about it sometime. I can’t personally describe what it felt like from his viewpoint, but I know he was frustrated. I was frustrated too, not so much at him but at the economy and just the whole situation. This was the beginning of 2009, the economy was at it’s worst and Nick was unemployed for 7 months. We were living off of my internship pay – $10 an hour part-time – since I was still a student. I graduated and moved into full-time graphic designer but they had “locked my pay” due to the economy being bad. I know he started feeling desperate after several months. We kept praying about it, and he applied all over the country, until finding a good opportunity in Arizona – and our families helped pay for our move (sometimes a little monetary gift is alright! :). After both finding jobs there we slowly got back on our feet. We didn’t love it in Arizona so Nick kept looking out for opportunities in Utah during the year and a half we were there, but it was a great experience and it felt good for us to “make it on our own.” And now we’re in the place we want to be. That was our experience, I just want to tell you that it can take time, and things can get pretty tough. But never give up hope and never stop praying about it. And tell your family that the more supportive they are to you, the more motivated and convinced you will be that a new job is just around the corner…
Thanks Debbie, I’m glad you shared your thoughts and experience here. This isn’t the first time my family has been through this experience, we know we will make it through this, and I am blessed to have a very supportive family and friends to help us through this. Your family is a blessing as well. I’m glad things have worked out for you and Nick, and I’m glad to see you leading out the way you are now. I know that something good, a very wonderful opportunity, is waiting for us. I have that faith, and I’m not letting it go even after that day comes.