I tried that myself-reinvent my career choice. This has been 10 years ago, then I was 50. When I started my life's journey, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I got married VERY young and before the age of 20, I was offered an opportunity to work in a bank, in bookkeeping. I jumped on the chance. So for approximately 14 years that is what I did. I worked in every department and took all the classes I could and made it to a middle management position. So, suffice to say, I did the first thing that was available whether it was my talent or passion, it was a living. Then after children were on their own, I decided to make a change and went back to school and trained for medical records coding. Made it through the class with A's and got the certificate. Came out and applied at local hospital, no openings. Applied for advertised job opening at a drug store. The first question asked, was ..have you ever worked in a medical office or setting before? Well, no, I had been in banking most of my career and insurance sales. So they just wrote me off right there. The old, how do you get experience without a job and how do you get a job with no experience. Now for those out of work, they get black marked for being out of work so long or their credit is in shambles- whatever. They will not say age discrimination.. that is the unspoken excuse. A company will say something like "we want someone who will be with us for many years." They can hardly wait to get you out the door when you start to look like you MIGHT draw retirement benefits. Or the company needs to cut cost by cutting the labor pool. Out the door you go, no loyalty to anything but their top management and the board room (if that). Understand, I live in a small community, it is not like there are a long list of jobs (medical coding ) around every corner. With coding, if you do not do it everyday or very regular you lose the well stocked codes you have built up from memory and the changes that keep coming out fast and furious. Basically the training was for naught. So many times in my life I have felt like a rat in a maze looking for the cheese, that turned the wrong corner and met with a dead end. Lots of them.

Amen brother. I'm in the same age group and know all too well a person can't go back to school, relocate in this housing market or get financing to start a service business.