Feeling lost at 42

[Lostat42]

I’m not really sure what I’m hoping for here but I’m at such a loss and so upset, and I really don’t know what to do.

I work in marketing, have done for around 14 years, and I thought my career was going well, however, I got massively screwed over by my last firm, essentially forced to leave and have ended up taking a job that I absolutely hate, and now I don’t know what to do :(

I was late to the marketing world as I went to Uni as a mature student but have spent the last 14 years in marketing, progressing to management which I have done for about 8 years.

I have always worked in or managed a team, until 4 years ago when I joined a firm in a standalone marketing manager role with the promise of being able to build my own team and have a budget to work with agencies etc. - essentially told that this company was growing and it needed a marketing person to grown and own the marketing function.

However, with Covid and there being zero investment in marketing, the team and budget never materialised, but I persevered as I hoped these things would come.

At the beginning of this year I was advised that I was finally going to get these things, plus I was given a pay rise and “outstanding” annual review. Even to the point of sitting down with my manager and outlining “my team”

However, there was a change in senior structure, a new senior management member was employed above my manger, and essentially hired a marketing director above me, without even telling me, despite the fact that I made no secret about that’s where I wanted to be headed.

As a result, and granted maybe a little knee-jerk, I found a new job and left. They could not guarantee me job security, I didn’t know how I fitted in to the new structure and I felt so hurt.

So, I have taken this new job and I just hate it. I have clearly rushed into it, and now I feel stuck. It’s another standalone role and I’m feeling overwhelmed, plus it’s an absolute mess there.

It doesn’t help that I feel so burnt out and I’m not confident in my abilities, my self esteem is on the floor and I have imposter syndrome.

In addition, I’m approaching 42 and I feel like my career is over, I’m stuck in this new job, I don’t know how to get out and don’t know what to do.

It’s also messed up my personal life, my partner and I had been trying for a baby (last attempt) and we were going to move house but all that has stalled.

I guess I’m looking for advice, or maybe inspirational stories where people have got out of a dark career period or made a change in their 40s.

Sorry for the long post.

No advice I'm afraid as I'm in the same boat q
At 37.

Trained hard to be in a financial services role last year, the company I know work for is in trouble with the FCA and I actually hate the job. I'm also not very good at it.

I wake up with a feeling of dread every morning 😔

I think it’s a Normal feeling after about 15 years. You need some sort of sabbatical or exit.

I would not postpone a baby at this stage. Keep on with that.

what I would do is look for a new job. Sometimes we jump and it doesn’t work out - and it’s not terrible to say you made a mistake and it’s not working out. You just have to word it carefully in interviews.

Oh no, can you leave and her something else?

m it’s horrible to dread work every day isn’t it. I’m not eve. Sleeping I’m so stressed out. I feel like taking 12 months off, but I’d essentially be walking away from a well paid job, however much I hate it.

Hope things get better for you….hugs!

I am in the same boat stuck in a job after being made redundant during covid from a job I loved. I am working on my exit strategy to upgrade my skill set and also on my CV, I want to be more choosy about where I go next but until then I am going to to have to stick here as no choice.

If I thought there was any money in feet pictures still, I'd be all over it 😂

I too felt like this in marketing. I woke up one day and felt my job was completely frivolous. I ended up spiralling and in a dark place and simplified my role as "marketing is all lies"

Someone was hired above me despite it being my obvious objective and the management telling me I was amazing. I left and side stepped into a new career (and took transferable skills with me)

I've been here since late August and I absolutely hate it. But now my CV is a mess and the job market is SO quiet where I am.

I have no real advice but I have found solace in making sure my home life is as enjoyable as possible.

We work to live. and we have to live! Right?

No advice but a nice firm handhold.

42 by a few days, refused to cry on my birthday as much as I wanted too.

Life's rich tapestry and all that.

A lot of friends want to chase the highest salary's possible but I'm interested to see what working much less hours does. Life is to short.

I hope you reach a better place soon.

Thank you all! Sorry, I’m not sure how to reply individually.

It seems we all, or a lot of us, hit an age where career becomes less important and home/personal life more so.

I am 42 tomorrow and I refuse to let this job ruin my birthday or Christmas, I think the plan in the new year is to step back, side step even if I have to take the financial hit. The stress and the not sleeping is not worth it.

For those in a similar position, nothing is permanent and there are always options, it just may take a while to find them!

I feel the same. I haven't moved jobs yet but I'm looking. I manage a small team and until recently also used to have a role in strategy and oversight of specific types of work across the wider team. However my boss's boss left, and my boss has decided it is better for junior staff development to have more responsibility. He also gave away some of our work to other teams. I don't think it's personal towards me, apparently it's to keep the junior members of staff happy. However it is quite humiliating for me, and I feel somewhat excluded from things I used to be involved in. I wouldn't mind if I had been given a new role within the team, but nothing has been given back to me after that was taken away.

This is all despite having feedback that I was doing outstandingly well and on track for promotion. Instead I am left with little role in the wider team, my main role now is just line management.

@Yesterdayyesterday it’s horrible isn’t it. As you say sometimes it’s not intentional or personal but it’s the disregard of your feelings that hurts. I had been running all marketing for my company single-handedly for four years, doing what I could on my own, and to get walked all over like that really hurt.

I’ve decided that my focus come 1st January is get over it and move on from this new sh*t job I’ve moved to. I hope your work situation gets better, or that you get a new role, whichever you desire the most.

hugs!

@Lostat42 Thank you, I have actually had thoughts of just quitting altogether recently as I have felt so down about it at times. I wish I could tell my boss about it but I think expressing too much negativity isn't going to look good for. me. I have asked for more work/responsibility but he hasn't given me anything.

So I'm actively job hunting now. There isn't much around for me at the moment, but I did apply for one last week and I have a chat with the recruiter about it on Monday. There is also a company I really like the look of who I heard will be recruiting soon, so fingers crossed. Whereas last year I would only have moved if it was a step up, I'd now be delighted to just do a lateral move.

Good luck with your job search too!

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Ah it's really hard isn't it.

My last few years in Marketing have been an absolute rollercoaster.

Got headhunted to what should have been the best job in the world, but it was actually a complete dumpster fire and I lasted less than a year.

I'm now on a 6 month contract at a new company but it's just meh. The people are nice but not friends. The job is interesting-ish but I'm not busy enough for my liking.

I miss having a team that felt like friends, and I don't know how to build it again in my 40s. Is it more of a young persons thing? Should I just accept that my heyday is over and I should just take what I can get?

Fuck knows. My heart has been broken by the last few years, personally and professionally, and I have lost all sight of what I need to do next.

My situation is different as I'm 53 and back in workplace 9 years post kids, and I haven't managed to "climb" in 9 years, it was making me feel so inadequate. I have another interview soon and if I don't go up a grade, that's it I give up and give myself permission to stop trying. I will take some unpaid leave and do a dressmaking course. Always wanted to do that. Also, I want to walk the camino but I will start with a shorter walking challenge. Sometimes I don't know why I'm trying so hard, the money would be a bit more. Sometimes the real job to take on is BEING YOURSELF and fitting what makes you happy in around the schedule of obligations but we all hesitate.

Just joining for solidarity. I had my dream job and loved it, then our company merged and the my director didn’t get the overall job and left so. Team I was moved into is toxic (with some nice people but an ineffective senior manager who sits on the fence rather than pulling up bad behaviour). I’ve been moved sideways within the team out of convenience as another was promised promotion and I’m the newbie despite being in the smaller organisation longer.

i can do my job but all the bits I’ve previously loved aren’t mine to do anymore and they manage to suck the joy out of those anyway so I didn’t bother fighting for them in this set up.

i now go to work for money. That is all. I turn up, do my hours and come home, making my family my priority (or at least I’m trying - not sure I’m quite there).

I’m doing a masters course that the previous organisation signed off and new senior team hates supporting so guilt trip me but can’t stop it due to previous contracts. I’ve stubbornly kept going and I’ll finish in 18 months. That’s when I’ll review next steps. I used to want to be a director but now I’m totally disillusioned, under appreciated and virtually invisible (like others, previous appraisals had been outstanding). Urgh, depressing.

It's really sad @TeenLifeMum how we are sold the dream of working hard and fulfilling your ambitions and work besties...

And actually most of it is out of our control. You join teams and lose teams and watch your plans go off track due to mergers etc and you've got to apparently still find joy and loyalty and motivation among it all.

It breaks your heart.

@HeyNando I loved my job for 8 years so I’m luckier than some. I’ve very much learned that it barely matters if I’m brilliant or mediocre. The senior team make and break careers and if your face doesn’t fit there’s nothing you can do.

That's exactly it. I've probably been guilty of my work and my work relationships being too important in my life. It makes it incredibly painful when outside forces dictate that you move on.

Marketing jobs have massively changed in the last 10 years and I don’t think the industry is in a good place. I’m the same age and feel similar. Looking to get out / pivot to self-employed copywriting. Solidarity.

Self-employed copywriting is suggested to me all the time. But I can't think of anything worse than working alone for most of the time.

I work hybrid now which is good for my family but bad for me mentally.

Its so hard isn't it, sending solidarity to you all. I've worked as a freelance undercover price checker/mystery shopper for years since I had my kids. Prior to kids I did secretarial work, but was too difficult with childcare etc. I did go on the staff bank at my local hospital and do some admin work for a bit about 7 years ago, but it ended badly and knocked my confidence. Luckily I was able to slide back into my price checking work without anyone questioning me. I've also done a copywriting course and a bit of voiceover training. @HeyNando I did do some copywriting work from home earlier this year, but tbh I hated it, partly cause of the subject matter and partly cause mentally I needed to be out and about, its so hard. Constantly looking or new ideas, but I feel too embarrassed to invest in any more training/courses when the things I have tried haven't worked out.

To complicate things further, I've just been diagnosed with breast cancer, I'm 48. I've had a lumpectomy so off work at the moment for two more weeks. I have radiotherapy in the new year, hoping to be able to work through that.

Like others, I want to make peace with what I have or haven't achieved, but something stops me.

I’m 42, worked in the same industry for 20 years. Desperate to get out!

I'm working alone in the office today and could actually cry.

I’m 47 and jumped into a new job (finance) as my old accounts role had become horrible (colleagues being reduced to tears as given unreasonable amounts of work - one new hire was recruited - a lovely lady age 40; and her Spanish-speaking line manager left two weeks later, then they slammed all that work on the new lady with no training and got extremely cross when she pointed out she couldn’t do it all and she didn’t speak Spanish (not a requirement for her own role) - how unreasonable! Two months later they sacked her and that was my final straw, seeing her broken by that awful management.

so that was a job I escaped.

New job started ok but rapidly deteriorated when new senior manager joined - this pushed to my manager quit and a lot of his work was dumped on me. I was also covering another manager on long term sick and had two team members on mat leave. I kept saying “I can’t do all of this” and my hours were escalating - we are talking 70 or 80 hours a week and still not getting it all done. I was crying with stress and not sleeping enough and it was getting worse not better and I thought “this is so NOT worth it”. So I quit and immediately worked to rule during my notice.Got shouted at a lot for that but I just calmly took it and said to myself “I did my best”.

it has been a really horrible experience in my two last roles and as a result I am taking time out to work out where on earth a woman in her 40s can work without being bullied, overlooked and taken for granted.

I am exploring part-time work in a related area - I don’t think I’ll be going back to my mainstream jobs for a while.