Retraining to a meaningful career in late 30s. Experiences

[Iwouldbecomplex]

I am 38 and a PA. I'm really good at my job but it bores me and I feel like it doesn't matter - it has no real impact in the world. I have kept at it for years because my husband and I have been trying to have a baby and I thought it would be an easy job to do around childcare. It's now looking likely that the baby will never come, so I'm now starting to think about what I'm actually going to do with the rest of my life. A bit of an existential crisis!

I have 11 GCSEs grades A*-B and 2 A levels grades B and C (English Lit and RE). I started a degree in philosophy but dropped out in year 2 due to family problems. I'm not sure I'm entitled to any more student loan because I've already had 2 years worth and haven't paid it all back yet.

I'm worried about doing a degree - I've been out of study for so long and my memory definitely isn't what it used to be! I'm worried I will invest so much time and money in to a course and will hate the job at the end or be crap at it. I'm scared of leaving my comfort zone I suppose.

And I don't know what to actually do. The NHS are offering a bursary type scheme so I have looked at nursing and AHP jobs. I have also looked at social work, counselling, emergency services, conservation, public health, environmental science.... the list is varied.

I know I don't want to work random shifts. I need routine. Money isn't particularly important to me so I'm not looking for a job with high earning potential, I just want to do something that makes me feel like I've mattered in the world.

I suppose I just want to hear from anyone who retrained at my age or older because they wanted to do something that made a difference. What did you do and why, do you like the job you do now, what we're the hardest things about it and was it all worth it?

I'm just feeling a bit lost really - sorry for the ramble!

I did a degree in my 30s. I'm now doing similar admin work to before. I'm still glad I did my degree for my own reasons, but it's been of very little use in changing career.

Only do a degree if it's for a specific career like teaching, nursing, social work, computer science. I did a general degree and found that for the careers I was interested in, in order to get the real graduate jobs you really need a masters these days. I was also really taken aback by the levels of ageism. Most employers want young graduates who'll work for nothing or very little. I know you said money isn't everything but you still have to pay the rent and feed your child.

Don't go into conservation. They expect you to do vast amounts of unpaid work before they'll even think about paying you. It's just not practical for mature graduates.

Counselling can be very rewarding and is usually done as a second career, but it can take a long time to build up clients and again you might have to do quite a lot of volunteer work to build up experience. Absolutely go for it if you're the right person, but you do need to invest a lot of money and many years into it before you can really make a living.

what about the civil service? identify an area you are interested in that has opportunities in your area (this could be a good way to narrow down your choices), get a foot in the door with your PA experience and work towards more interesting operational or policy jobs? you could do a part time degree or masters alongside work. This would be a good approach for Public Health or Environmental stuff.

It sounds as if what you need first is some professional careers guidance - before you take any decisions.

There would be absolutely no point in signing up for re-training of any sort of you haven't yet established exactly what your strengths and weaknesses are and what type of work (and study towards it) would suit you best.

So maybe use this time to put your energies into preparatory investigation. I'm certain there are careers workshops / one to one meetings, etc that can be undertaken online / via FT or Skype. And there are obviously updates on 'What Colour is Your Parachute' type workbooks that might help.

I cannot personally envisage a natural progression from philosophy to PA-ing to frontline NHS work. What are you actually interested in?

If the money isn't critical then can you replace one day a week work with volunteer work in those areas on your list and see what actually suits you in reality

I have also looked at social work, counselling, emergency services, conservation, public health, environmental science....

e.g. Citizens Advice, Samaritans, your local wildlife trust, buddy schemes for kids, hospital volunteer

Thank you all for your comments and advice. I have given it a lot more thought and decided the first step should be voluntary work so I applied yesterday to volunteer at my local domestic abuse charity as it's a cause that's close to my heart and work in the charity sector and in particular with adults is something I feel very drawn to. So I will volunteer for a while and then decide on my next move