SO TRUE

OUT OF A JOB

This is it, the end of life as I know it.

I've worked all my life but starting Monday morning I'll be out of a job. Compulsory retirement. Used abused and tossed away like a snotty Kleenex. 35 years invested in a career and suddenly I'm unemployed (along with hundreds of other mill employees). I understand about business but that doesn't help, especially when our plant made more profit than any other in our sector last year.

I could go back to school but after getting a 2 year degree I'll be 60-61 and who wants to hire an old woman? Plus I was interested in computer programming/security and I've been informed in no uncertain terms that "it's a young person's field".

I have no social life outside of work. All my friends are married and their husbands consider a single woman a threat.

I don't date, haven't in years. Most of the men my age aren't interested in women my age.

I won't have money to travel like I dreamed in my retirement fantasies.

Enough bitching; time to put on my big girl panties and get on with it. Donna says that I can join her in a life of leisure and poverty. Guess that's my new life plan….

JUST WONDERFUL

"Retirement Boosts Your Risk of Depression by 40 Percent According to a new report released by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA),1 following an initial boost in health, retirement increases your risk of clinical depression by 40 percent while raising your chances of being diagnosed with a physical condition by 60 percent. It also: •Reduces your likelihood of being in self-reported excellent or very good health by 40 percent •Raises your risk of taking medication for a diagnosed physical condition by 60 percent The study’s author, who called retirement’s impacts on health “drastic,” suggested a later retirement age may actually be preferable, noting: 2 “New research presented in this paper indicates that being retired decreases physical, mental and self-assessed health. The adverse effects increase as the number of years spent in retirement increases.”

Seems like my forced retirement might not be all that enjoyable. Nothing to do, nowhere to go and no money nor anyone to do it with.