Boy, When The Hammer Drops, It Drops HARD!

Jim,
 
Hang in there brother. I don’t know your situation but have been thru much the same thing. Tragic loss of dear family and then devastating loss of job on the tail end just to grind the knife deeper. Waking up day after day in the same pain over the death and now having to deal with how to pay rent and feed two dependents. Maybe I was more lucky because of the remaining family. Close bonds and support.
 
My prayers are with you. Don’t get offended though if I say that more than prayers are needed.
 
All I can share is what I did to eventually overcome the damnation. I was hoping you were a US resident because could have given specifics of how to work the system. See that you are in Canada, but maybe you are in an even better place to get on top of this.
 
I saw first hand how shallow most condolences and best wishes were. Nobody really gave a damn. “Sorry for your loss. Got to go pick up the kids” Pinnacle moment was a friend passing by in the hall. Asked, how are you doing? I said miserable. Answer was “Good, glad to hear it” I realized I was really alone in this.
 
I had to assess where I was and where I was headed. The grief was debilitating, but the rent demand didn’t care. The electric company shed no tears. Laid off aircraft mechanic with no jobs anywhere in the area.
 
I had to kick myself in the ass and get it together in spite of the universe falling apart around me and just wanting to crawl into a dark hole. Realize I am not aiming this at you, just me.
 
I had to get work or some sort of interim support. I went into the local welfare office and sat at one of the jobs terminals. Spent hours going thru job analysis. Reading up on everything from grave diggers to engineers, physicians to basket weavers.
 
Pharmacy looked cool and always had a love of biology and chemistry.
 
Did all my homework. Had a plan. Approached the state with an offer. I was old, fried to a crisp, poisoned with cumulative exposure to industrial chemicals, bent and broken from years of hard labor and could no longer do a high wire balance act to change a light bulb on an aircraft wing 50 feet off the ground.
 
My offer was that I was about to fall back as a vegetable on welfare. Sign me up for medicaid, welfare check and food stamps for the next 40 years.
 
Alternative offer was to help me retrain into something I could still do and be a tax paying citizen. Laid out my homework on receptive ears and got the beginning support for 6 years of pharmacy education. Fought for every grant, every stipend along the way.
 
Was in my 50’s before I started the new job with a shiny doctor’s title. Treated us real good for 15 years until it was really time to retire. Keeping my license active anticipating going back to work part time at some point. Otherwise I’ll drive the wife crazy being here all the time.
 
Point of my tirade is that life is merciless. Survival of the fittest still rules unfortunately. You have to be fluid and bending, smart and adaptive. As long as life is in you, there is hope. At 56, I pray you can rebound. You may not be able to do heavy physical work, but there are so many things out there you still may be able to do, making a respectable and decent living. Re-education is the key for you.
 
In the US many years ago, your training tuition covered just that. Tuition and a few books after which you were on your own. Now you can cover rent, food and other living needs in the student loans. Depends on your stomach for debt, but a new career pathway with education, certification may be what you need. Both to survive in the physical and get your mind in a positive direction beyond the pain of your family situation.
 
Tip from my perspective is look at the healthcare industry. Good paying and honorable technician licenses can be had in anywhere from 6 months to 2 years study that don’t require you to lug around a hundred pound bag of cement.
 
God bless,
 
John

Wow, Jim.  You really are getting the s**t end of the stick these days....  I hope you can persevere.  Like John said, life can be merciless.  Once a fault opens, other problems seem to get in.  I wish you luck.
 
Recently I was looking at a "post 40 career change" too, in health care.  Have you looked at Health Care Administration courses at a local college or university?  I know that some gov't agencies can offset the costs (EI, Welfare, etc).  If you've already run your own business, I'm sure you've got the ability and would just need to learn how to navigate the professional red tape.
 
I know in Toronto, there is a large need right now for college/university administrators.  It's probably similar in Vancouver.  It's my wife's field, and seems to rely more on common sense and life experience than formal education.  Again, you sound like you may be suitable.  As well, it's a field that can give you actual validation, knowing that you're making a difference (as opposed to my day-in, day-out office drone life).  It might be worth getting in touch with the local schools.

Couple additional thoughts about the healthcare jobs...
 
Outside administrative positions, the radiology techs make good money and have to put up with minimal blood and gore except for in traumatic accidents. The specially trained docs have to interpret. Irony is that the tech's position is safer than the MD. Trend is sending the images over to Mongolia or wherever and get them read for pennies on the dollar of a western MD. Someone though has to take the pictures. I've seen the techs stay while the doc is laid off.
 
Physical and occupational therapists also having to deal with less body fluids. Pharmacy tech can be 100 percent isolated from patients in a hospital setting, but the stress level is extreme. If a pharmacy tech, in general go for the hospital environment, not the community pharmacies. The hospital pharm tech also makes considerably more than the community counterpart.
 
CNA stuff can be nasty at times, but if used as a pathway to an RN, one of the most versatile licenses in the industry. Wide variety of work settings once you have the license. In the Boeing factory, the guy with the best job was the environmental adviser with his RN degree. We would be sweating like pigs on the floor losing fingers, hearing. This guy would come out of his air conditioned office in a white shirt every once in awhile, clean finger nails to lecture us on the dangers of drinking the solvents. Also made twice as much per hour as we did. The way things are shifting around, RN may be more desirable than MD in some instances and way quicker to achieve.