Career 2.0
How did you fall into your career in healthcare? In my case, I thought I found the perfect fit for my interests and abilities--and were it not for the current state of affairs, with the drive to wring greater production from us for less pay and shrinking benefits, I would have been content to stay put until I'm old and grey. That obviously being the case, however, I've started down this path--hopefully, toward a better-paying, more secure, more respected, and perhaps even more meaningful career. Much as I enjoy my job in general, I find the fact that cancer registrars actually can help define which treatments work and which factors predispose people to disease somehow more noble than merely helping to document a patient's bowel habits and pill count for the billing department.
Still, as I was already at an age where my kids were fairly self sufficient when I started MT, I've had even more misgivings about starting from scratch again. Do I have the strength? the brain power? the intestinal fortitude to start back at the bottom of the pile? This time around, I also have to work around a full-time job as I struggle to complete my studies, often a source of frustration and discouragement--and I'm not even counting the entropy that's overtaken my household anymore. Not like I have time or energy to entertain anyway, right?
Apparently, though, mid-life career change is all the rage. I got an invitation to enter a contest at site called Encore, which is apparently skewed toward baby boomers turning their lives inside out as middle age (ugh) threatens. Now, my first inclination was akin to when I get those AARP ads (OMG--those people start trolling when they see you turn 40!); as soon as I saw grey, I winced and closed the tab. In my head, I'm cruising along in my early 20s. I have more in common with my kids (who were born already older than I), and will probably never feel a connection with those people in the AARP flyers. It irks me to see Sean Connery looking paunchy and tired and songs I grew up with appearing as Muzak at the supermarket. After wasting half my life on a lousy marriage, I'm looking for the do-over of that misspent youth, not looking ahead to empathize with incontinence, laxative, and Viagra ads. . . Criminy.
After thinking about it, though, I decided it might be helpful to at least see what they claim to offer. It's not easy to decide to change careers, especially when you're talking about women who've played the thankless role of Mommy for 20+ years (we know that mommies in general make up the vast majority in the pink collar ghetto of medical transcription) and have no clue how to base a résumé on something employers don't respect. According to the site, "Encore.org provides news, resources and connections for individuals and organizations establishing "encore careers" that combine social contribution, personal meaning and financial security. People in their encore careers are helping to improve health care, educate the next generation, protect the environment and much more."
I haven't had time to investigate the site thoroughly, but I do note that they appear to offer educational grants, including one category specifically to provide "grants for innovative community colleges preparing people 50+ for careers in education, health care and social services." "Find your Encore" helps you figure out where to begin thinking about a new career, which might be helpful for those of us without much of a clue beyond, "I really need to make a change. . ." but floundering helplessly beyond that. If the site offers nothing beyond this, it might be worthwhile.
What I find most interesting is that baby boomers (we're talking the generation that helped end segregation and stop a war, remember) seem to be challenging and redefining everything as we go. Granted, our parents didn't have to cope with the same problems we do, but it would have been inconceivable 20 years ago to jettison a career you'd trained for and start fresh. Of course, "back in the day," respect between employer and employee was more of a two-way street than it is now. Perhaps in declaring ourselves unwilling to settle for something that doesn't satisfy our needs for financial security, acknowledgement of our worth, and some sense of purpose beyond the workplace, the paradigm will begin to change for the better.