Tough Times after Job Loss
By Doris Long, Efland, NC

December 14, 2001 was my last day of work at Nortel Network in RTP after 18 years of employment as a Quality Inspector.  My salary had been sufficient to have the things I needed and to pay the bills. I had health insurance and other company benefits. But all of a sudden, all of that changed. I grew up accustomed to hard work. I was raised on a farm in Cedar Grove, the youngest in a family of 10 children. My family raised tobacco. We had chicken, pigs, and vegetable gardens.  Although my family was poor, our farm helped us provide a lot of food, and we were able to pay the bills.  We were blessed to be raised on a farm. My family never did go without food. We didn’t owe anything on the house that we lived in. 

After I was laid off from Nortel in 2001, I knew that my life was going to dramatically change financially. I attended Alamance Community College in Graham in Medical Office Administration in 2002 and 2003. In September 2003, before I finished, I still did not have a job. I prayed and asked God to help me. 

As I faced hard times, lonely, sad, and ashamed of my situation, I really had to trust God. My family was no support, nor was my old church. I cried many nights, my pillow wet with tears. It was so hard for me to ask for help from anyone – even my friends, I was so ashamed when I had to go to Social Services and ask for help and see people there that knew me. My heart was heavy many days, and I learned to do without a lot of things. But God has really blessed me now in other ways.  Presently, I am a member of the Cedar Grove United Methodist Church - a new family, new friends, good fellowship. I attend Bible study, Sunday School, and Living the Word, and serve as the Acolyte Leader and a Choir Member.

I have worked a lot of temporary jobs since being laid off in 2001. Trying to find permanent, full-time employment with health insurance has been very difficult. At the present time, I am working part-time at Harris Teeter, 24 -30 hours a week.  I make $8.00 an hour, and last month my take-home pay was $414. I don't have enough to pay my mortgage. I have to trust God that someone will hear my prayer and help me, or I will have to ask some of my friends to help me with my mortgage.  After paying for utilities, food, and other necessities, I don't have much leftover.

When I have been hired at jobs in the past, I found ways to encourage my co-workers because many live paycheck to paycheck, just like me. I tell them "Be grateful and appreciate your job, because you never know when your job will end. But God will see you through. God can do anything." As I finish this story, I am happy inside to know that my story can be used so that someone else can see how it is to go through adversity and difficult financial situations.