How can you recover after you've been laid off?
Being laid off is a major life event for anyone, and it raises so many debilitating questions in your mind. If you’ve been laid off recently, this article is for you. The present and the future both look foggy right now, but there are several small things you can do that can have a phenomenal incremental impact on your wellbeing and career. Let’s talk about how you can recover from such a drastic change in your life, and make the best out of it.
Tips to recover from layoffs
There are two costs involved in layoffs. One is direct costs including severance, continuing healthcare, and emotional support. Another is indirect costs including the attitude of the people retained, broken trust, employees caring less about quality and safety, and less willing to take risks.
1. Pause for a while
Give yourself a moment to grieve, and take a break. You shouldn’t have to jump headfirst into job searching or the next stage of your life and career immediately, after having suffered a severe blow to your self-esteem. Acknowledge what you feel, and if you need to take a day or two to process what happened, so be it.
2. Throw light on your side hustle
If you’ve been putting off a hobby or interest of yours for another day, bring it out from under the covers and start pursuing it. If you’ve had a way with arts and crafts, or embroidery, or fitness, or language teaching, give it a go now. It’ll help you take your mind off your layoffs, and worries, and indulge you in something you love. The positive reinforcement you get from doing what you love is great for your self-esteem at this point in your life.
3. Take a skill inventory
Sit down to do an inventory of all your skills, interests, and hobbies, and note down the ones you can monetize in the form of a side hustle, or a job. Recollect all instances where you’ve had success using the skill. Reach out to people you’ve worked with and ask them what areas they felt comfortable asking for your help, and include them in your list too. This will help you broaden your choice of venture in the next phase of your career.
4. Build your support system
Rediscover your tribe – your safe people who hold you, and give you the space you need to give your emotions an outlet, meaning, and a way to navigate through the difficult time. Layoffs inherently bring out a sense of worthlessness, which is a huge symptom of depression. You need your A-team to keep going. Reach out to loved ones who will lend a shoulder for you to cry on, or a sympathetic ear to listen to you talk, and cheer you up. Go beyond your close circle to an online network of professionals in your domain, who have been laid off, or people who are willing to share valuable advice that’ll help you take the next step. Stay connected to your peers and mentors who can lend you a helping hand at this time.
5. Create a healthy daily routine
Consciously schedule your day into slots of job hunting, learning, networking with peers and recruiters, working on your side hustle, working out, catching up with friends and family, etc, so your mind is occupied, you build your self-esteem while creating opportunities for yourself.
What happens when the emotional impact of being laid off isn’t treated?
Initially, when you hear the news, especially if you’ve not seen it coming, you have to bear and process a lot of information, and the emotions that come with it. Different people respond to a loss differently, but here are a few common initial reactions:
- Overwhelmed by intrusive thoughts that make you doubt yourself and your self-worth
- Denial, and the belief that everything will go back to normal
- Rage, and wanting to confront the people responsible for the decision
- Meltdown out of fear of the uncertainty ahead
- Transferring one’s negative emotions onto others (loved ones)
Your reaction may be completely different, and that’s absolutely okay. What’s important is how you channel your emotions, give them space, and process them. Most people’s first reaction after being laid off isn’t talking to a therapist. In fact, they may not open up to anyone for a while. Over time, in the fear of appearing vulnerable or helpless, they tend to bottle up their feelings.
Niharika Gupta, a Counseling Psychologist says, “When emotions are bottled up for a long time, without any means to release or process them, it has a great chance of leading to developing mental health disorders, especially if they’re neurotic. Neurotic disorders aren’t genetic, but can be a result of chronic stress and anxiety.”
When you suppress emotions long enough and experience stress, you’re likely to show anxiety symptoms, like profuse sweating, shaking, and shortness of breath. This is the biology behind anxiety. In the beginning, you may feel you’re simply zoning out, feeling overly emotional, irritable, or having random meltdowns. This may compound over time and even result in full-on panic attacks if left unattended.
That’s why you need professional help right when a loss like a layoff happens – to help you cope with the difficult time, address problematic symptoms in the bud, and develop healthy coping mechanisms like the ones listed in the previous section.
If you’ve had a history of mental health issues in the past, or a history of anxiety, you may exacerbate the condition if you don’t give yourself time and resources to recover from a major life event, such as an unexpected layoff.
Therapy journey after you’re laid off
Niharika Gupta, a Counseling Psychologist says, “The therapy journey for a person who has been laid off comes in different stages. It starts with giving space for them to vent, validate their emotions, explore their emotions and thoughts, set goals for their wellbeing, and train them in healthy behaviors, thinking patterns, and coping mechanisms.”
Therapists say that most people who have been laid off need the right space to vent what’s going on in their minds. They may talk incoherently, which is fine, but they need to bring out everything that’s bothering them. Sometimes, people may turn silent, and feel numb. Therapy techniques can get them to speak slowly and share what’s going on inside them.
This phase goes on for a while, during which the therapist listens, helps them validate their emotions, and empathizes with them. After this initial stage, they delve deeper into an explorative journey and understand what the person feels, and where they’re stemming from.
Niharika Gupta, a Counseling Psychologist says, “We don’t work with labels in therapy, so we explore what different emotions mean to the client. If they say they feel like an imposter, we enquire what they mean by that, and start exploring from there.”
From there on, the therapist helps them set goals for their wellbeing and trains them on skills that will help them replace any unhelpful thoughts or behaviors they have with healthier ones.
How can Manah help?
Manah offers counseling and mental health support in various forms, including 24/7 call support, wherein people in distress, or anyone who wants to talk to a professional can call, and will be supported in their needs.
In the Manahverse app, you can schedule counseling sessions, journal, access on-demand wellbeing resources, and do a lot more to get started with your wellbeing journey. Contact us to know more and get the right help at the right time.