A painful job loss brings unexpected rewards

Tamara Burchette was depressed about losing her job. So she found a creative way to pull herself out of her funk: She joined a dance team. “It’s called the Louisiana Ladies,” says Tamara,

who is 56 and lives in Slidell, Louisiana. “We perform in parades and charity events. I’m not a dancer, but they took everyone who tried out. We encourage each other at all ages, and I’m not

even the oldest one!” Encouragement was exactly what Tamara needed when the company she had been with for more than a decade was bought. “The new owners brought in their own people and got

rid of us. It was awful,” she remembers. Dancing helped her cope with the loss, but she knew she had to find another job. Tamara, who grew up in Pascagoula, Mississippi, is no stranger to

job hunting; in fact, she’s been working full-time jobs since she was 19. She had planned to go to college and study design, but when her son was born just after her high school graduation,

those plans had to change. She found a position as a buyer for a construction project, where she was the only woman in the office — and the only employee with a baby in tow. “I had to bring

him with me,” she says. “I remember carting him around the office in his car seat.” Finding a new job at 56 was different, though, and Tamara was unsure of what to do next. She visited

Tri-Parish Works, the local employment office. The career specialist there told her about AARP Foundation’s BACK TO WORK 50+, which provides unemployed older workers with a suite of tools

and coaching resources to help them compete with confidence for today’s high-quality, in-demand jobs. Tamara signed up right away. “I went to all the meetings and learned everything I

could,” she says. “The classes are so well designed. They teach you exactly what you need to do, step by step: interviewing, keywords to use for your skills, how to dress, what to include on

a résumé. Everything you need to know.”