The First Time Broke the Floor Open
The first time I got laid off, they tried to make it look like an ordinary meeting.
An invite showed up in my inbox late Sunday night from the vice president of the department, with a vague title about marketing updates. Nothing alarming on the surface. But when I opened it and saw only her name on the invite, something felt off immediately. I texted two of my closest coworkers. They had similar meetings on their calendars, staggered throughout the morning.
That was the moment everything changed. We knew we were being laid off in the morning.
Some part of me still held out hope, because you always do. But by the time my alarm went off the next morning, the texts had already started. One person had been let go at 8 a.m. Then another. Then another. By the time my meeting arrived, the outcome felt almost certain.
I was still shocked when it happened.
The company was a pharmaceutical company that had played an integral part during the pandemic. I had worked there for eight years, with an exemplary performance record. I had been the only web developer in an organization that once had 22,000 employees. I had built and maintained the website ecosystem. I knew the architecture, the security setup, the moving parts, the pieces that nobody else understood the way I did. Nobody in the company had access to or visibility into the website’s tech stack. I thought that meant security for me.
The layoffs were massive and the result of the company being acquired by another company. I had spent months working through the acquisition, helping prepare the company for a major transition, removing references to sold facilities, coordinating with legal, supporting communications, and publishing the acquisition announcements.
The deal closed in December.
I was let go in January.
That part stung.
It did not just feel like losing a job. It felt like being used hard for months and then discarded once the work was done. I was devastated, but I was also offended. Insulted. I had thought there was safety in being essential.
There wasn’t.
My role was ultimately eliminated and absorbed by external agencies.
What It Really Felt Like
The day itself was a blur.
There was paperwork. Severance details. Text messages were coming in nonstop. Calls with family. Group texts with the people who had been let go and the people who were still there. We joked about being the “outies” and the “innies,” because Severance was airing at the time, and sometimes humor is the only thing holding things together.
For most of the day, I was still trying to lead.
That had always been my role on that team, whether anyone formally acknowledged it or not. I kept people laughing. I kept information moving. I tried to make sure nobody felt alone. I was still trying to do the thing I had always done, which was taking care of my people.
Day turned into night, and then the night got quiet.
People stopped texting. People went to bed. The noise faded.
And that was when it hit me.
I was still awake. Alone. Scared. Feeling the full weight of the uncertainty. Feeling like I would never find a job again, or make that much money again.
That was the moment I cried. Not because I decided to. It just happened. The day had carried me forward, and when the day was over, there was nothing left between me and the rawness of it.
The next day, I let myself fall apart a little.
I stayed in pajamas. I slept late. I drank cocktails. I ordered trash food. I watched television. I felt sorry for myself, and I allowed that to be the whole point of the day. It was not drifting. It was not a surrender.
It was a contained day of mourning. I gave myself one day to feel it.
I gave myself one day of grace.
Then It Was Time to Get to Work
The next morning, I woke up, and as soon as I opened my eyes, the first thought in my head was simple.
Let’s get to work.
The second thought was just as clear.
I’m done feeling sorry for myself.
There wasn’t any sort of cinematic realization behind it. No speech. No grand internal transformation. That is just how I am wired. I gave myself the day of grace, and then I was done. There was work to do, and I needed to start doing it.
My first priorities were practical survival. I need to file for unemployment. I need to complete all of the everance package paperwork. I had to make sure my health benefits wouldn’t be interrupted. There were modifications to my pay that needed to be completed to ensure paychecks continued to be deposited. I had to set up access to the employee transition service the company provided. I registered for everything I was supposed to register for and started figuring out what mattered.
I also started sharing everything I learned with the others who had been let go. If I hit a snag, I told them how I got through it. If someone misunderstood unemployment or severance, I explained what I had found. When we compared severance packages and discovered one person had received far less than the rest of us because of a clerical issue, we helped her get an employment lawyer. Eventually, she got the package she should have received.
That mattered to me.
They were my team.
If we had to go through it, we were going to go through it together.
Building the System
Once the immediate logistics were handled, I moved into rebuilding mode. I had to get my resume completely rebuilt first. After that, it was time for a complete overhaul of my LinkedIn profile. Once those two things were complete, the next step was setting up my job search infrastructure and uploading my new resume to various job search sites.
That was also the day I subscribed to ChatGPT, which is funny now because that became the start of an entirely new working system for me. I used AI to help rethink my resume, strengthen my LinkedIn profile, prepare for applications, and organize my thoughts. I was not using it as a shortcut. I was using it as leverage.
I also leaned into something I never expected to become valuable during a job search.
TikTok.
I had somehow ended up on job search TikTok before getting laid off, saving videos from creators who gave practical advice on resumes, LinkedIn optimization, interview answers, and AI prompts. Once I was out of work, that random collection of saved videos became a library.
There were resume templates designed to work with recruiter systems that came with matching cover letter templates. I had an array of prompts for rebuilding LinkedIn. Multiple videos on Interview guidance to avoid trap questions. Even a transparent notes app that could sit on screen during virtual interviews, so I would not forget key points while still seeing the interviewer.
It sounds ridiculous until it works.
And it worked.
All of it actually worked.
My new, rebuilt-from-scratch resume immediately began to garner attention. My freshly overhauled LinkedIn profile pulled recruiters in. The interview prep helped me stay sharp and entirely prepared for interviews. The notes app gave me confidence, even if the act of writing the points mattered more than having them on screen, because it helped me commit the answers to memory.
Eight weeks later, I had a job.
If you’re trying to build your own system and don’t know where to start, I’ve kept a running list of the resources that actually worked. Reach out through the site, and I’ll point you in the right direction.
Refusing to Rot
The biggest rule I made for myself during those eight weeks of unemployment was that I was not going to rot.
I was not going to sleep until noon every day. I was not going to live in pajamas. I was not going to disappear into a hole of doom scrolling, video games, and bourbon.
Every morning, I got up and got dressed in actual clothes I had set out the night before. I fed the dogs. I brushed my teeth. I took my meds. I made tea and caffeinated while I played my NYT game and listened to news podcasts. I did my Duolingo Spanish. I checked in on what was happening in the world.
That structure mattered.
There is only so much time you can spend refreshing job boards before the lack of movement starts to eat at you. So I built rhythm around the search without letting the search consume every hour of the day.
I went through the transition services that were offered, but they felt more like something to fill time than something that actually moved things forward. The real work started when I built my own system.
Weekdays were for job search work, networking, LinkedIn, applications, and keeping up with the people who had been let go with me. Weekends were for chores, yard work, cleaning, and keeping my life from collapsing around the edges. Before I got let go, I had started planning and booking a trip to Yuma to do dental tourism in Mexico. I was determined to still make that trip, so the planning continued.
The days were not glamorous.
But they consisted of structured maintenance, and maintenance is what keeps you from sliding. It keeps you moving forward.
The Moment It Changed
The recruiter who eventually led me to my new role called while I was in an Airbnb in Yuma, in pajamas, drinking coffee, and working on Wordle.
That is not exactly how you imagine a career turning point happening, but there it is.
She had found my LinkedIn profile, looked at my resume, and wanted to talk about a Director of Digital Marketing Operations role. I explained I was traveling, so we set up a call for when I got back.
The role was working for an NYC-based technology company and came with a significant title bump and an exceptional salary increase. It also came with a four-day-a-week commute to downtown Manhattan, which I knew would be brutal, but at the time, it felt worth pursuing.
The interviews went well, and the offer came in. I countered, because as a rule I won’t take the first offer unless it’s the maximum listed in the job description. They accepted my counter. I consulted with my friends and family, and they all agreed I should try it. I agreed too.
I promised myself I would give it a year and then reevaluate after that. And I did. I really disliked working for this company. I had little attachment to the company and struggled with the commute, culture, and overall environment. As I approached my first anniversary, I began overhauling my LinkedIn again, updating my resume. I started applying and even had an interview.
Turns out that was for the best because thirteen months after being hired, to the day, my role was eliminated. Once again, the role was absorbed by external agencies.
That was two days ago as I sit here writing this.
The Second Time Was Different
The second layoff happened in a completely different emotional climate.
My CMO scheduled a meeting under the pretense of needing clarification on a website page. That alone irritated me because so much of the job had become explaining digital marketing technology to people who did not understand it. Usually, explaining it to him.
As soon as the meeting started, he admitted the reason for the meeting was a ruse.
The company had lost a major client. Every department had to cut someone. Marketing was already barebones, and I was the cut they could make because agencies that were already in place had claimed they could absorb enough of my work for the company to eliminate the role.
As he was speaking, I could feel the old reaction start.
The tunnel vision. My blood pressure was rising. That familiar internal sentence was beginning to form.
I can’t believe this is happening to me.
And then I stopped it. Immediately.
A voice in my head cut through it, clear as day.
Stop. What are you doing? You can’t stand this job. You can’t stand this company. This commute has negatively affected every part of your life. You are not being fired. You are being set free, and more importantly, you never ever have to come back here again.
And just like that, the dread receded.
I could feel my body settle. I could think clearly. I could respond clearly. More importantly, I understood something in real time.
This was not like the last time I was laid off at all. Rather, the last layoff had prepared me for this very moment.
I already had the system and tools in place to handle this situation.
I was going to be fine… better even.
No Tears This Time
There were no tears that night. No collapse. No identity crisis.
If anything, I found myself calming down family, friends, and colleagues who were reaching out to check on me. I kept telling them I was fine, and I meant it.
That does not mean the situation was ideal. The company offered no severance package whatsoever. They timed the layoffs to happen on the last day of the month, so all benefits were lost the next day.
Losing income is serious. Losing health insurance is serious. Having to sort through unemployment, COBRA, marketplace insurance, recruiters, scams, and next steps is serious.
But emotionally, it was different.
The pharma company felt like a devastating loss. The tech company felt like being released.
I had no deep attachment to the company; in fact, I actively disliked working there.
So this time, the layoff did not feel like a door slamming shut.
It felt like someone opened one.
What I Did Instead
The next day, I did not rush into the yard and bury myself in house projects just to avoid thinking. I wanted to, but I stopped myself. There would be time for weeding, mulching, and mowing.
First, there were things to handle.
I posted on LinkedIn to let my network know I was available. That mattered. The post started getting traction immediately, generating profile views, reactions, reposts, and messages. I filed for unemployment. I canceled and rearranged medical appointments to give me time to sort out insurance. I checked on upcoming prescription renewal costs. I talked to my family. I responded to people reaching out. I requested LinkedIn recommendations from people who offered help. I renewed LinkedIn Premium at a discount and set a reminder to cancel before it renewed at full price.
Then came the recruiters.
Some messages were useful, but most were not. The flood of “opportunities” that arrives after you announce you are looking is not always an opportunity. A lot of it is noise. A lot of it is scammy. You have to sort carefully, and AI can help you sort the legitimacy from the bullshit.
But that, too, felt different this time. Last time, when I made my looking for work post, and the messages started flooding in, I was naive. I thought this was great. Look at all these contacts. And when I realized they were scammers trying to phish my personal info, I was slightly crushed that people could be such bottom feeders to take advantage of people at their lowest.
This time, it was a mild aggravation, because I knew how to move through it.
What Actually Matters
Getting laid off can trigger panic. That is normal. I am not going to pretend panic is avoidable. Sometimes your brain has to run the emergency script before you can get back in charge and take over the reins.
The key is not letting that script become your new operating system.
Panic gets its moment. You have to let it run its course, and then you move on.
You handle the essentials first: unemployment, health insurance, severance if there is any, pay, benefits, prescriptions, and anything else tied to stability. Then you build the job search system: resume, LinkedIn, applications, networking, interview prep, and visibility.
You get dressed. You set up a routine, and you keep to it. You do not let every day become an unstructured slog.
You set rules for the things that can swallow time: drinking, eating, gaming, scrolling, sleeping too late, and calling it “rest” when it is really avoidance. That distinction matters. Rest helps you recover. Avoidance keeps you stuck.
What to Do in Week One
If you get laid off, take a day if you need it. Feel bad. Wear the pajamas. Order the food. Drink the drinks. Cry if it happens. Let yourself absorb the hit.
Then get up.
Start with the essentials. File for unemployment. Understand your benefits. Review your severance if you have one. Figure out health insurance. Check prescriptions. Make sure you know where money is coming from and where the gaps are.
Then turn to your professional materials.
Update your resume. Update LinkedIn. Make sure both are strong before announcing anything publicly. When you are ready, post clearly and professionally that you are open to your next opportunity.
Use every tool that helps. AI. Templates. Job search creators. Recruiter advice. Interview prep. Your network. The point is not to do it the old way because it feels noble. The point is to get found, get conversations, and get back in motion.
And while you do all of that, protect your day.
Wake up at a reasonable hour. Get dressed. Keep your routines. Create work blocks. Take breaks that are actually breaks.
Do not allow yourself to confuse being unemployed with being rudderless.
What It Feels Like (And Why It’s Wrong)
The worst part of getting laid off is how final it feels.
There is a part of you that thinks you will never find another job. Never make that kind of money again. Never have work friends again. Never rebuild the version of yourself that existed before the meeting invite, the HR call, or the “business decision.”
But that is fear talking.
Your next job is out there.
Your next work best friend is out there.
Your next version of yourself is out there, too.
You still have to do the work to find them.
What people get wrong is thinking the layoff is the end of the story. It is not. It is the end of a chapter. A brutal chapter sometimes, but still only a chapter.
The mistake is spiraling, and letting the shock of the situation convince you that the book is over.
The Final Takeaway
Getting laid off can feel like the end of the world.
It is not.
It is the end of a version of your life that was always more fragile than you wanted to believe.
Give yourself grace. Make a plan. Build structure. Get to work.
The first time it happened to me, I was wrecked.
The second time, I felt the spiral start and stopped it before it could take over.
That is the difference experience makes.
The layoff is not what defines you.
It’s how you handle it and pick yourself back up that defines you.