Hi chapo, How the fuck do you find work when you have major gaps in your resume?

Short story: I went through a long fucked up period dealing with addiction and mental health issues. I'm fairly okay now mentally/psychically. But I'm having a real hard time finding work. Last time I had a "real" job was over five years ago, also around the time I graduated college. But I have nothing to put on my resume since then. I have zero networking connects, no one to put as a reference.

I need a job real bad but I don't know what to do. With no experience and no connects I feel like no one wants to hire me, but I can't fulfill those requirements without finding work that I can't get. I fucking hate it.

I'm also dogshit at doing interviews and I don't know how to explain long work absences without freaking out employers. What can I do?

P.S. I don't wanna say where I live for privacy reasons but I do not live in America.

  • PurrLure [she/her]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Lying about PC builds and photography seems like a great idea. You can create a temporary persona during interviews pushing the idea that you're a real go-getter.

    The grandparent thing is very overused nowadays. You can do it, but I think it might lower your chances. If you're gonna go through with it, maybe say it was your mom instead to make them feel more pity for you.

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe a big perk about saying you tried to start your own freelancing business is that it's harder to look up with a social security number. Just make a nice glossy social media page or two and include it on linkedin and you should be ok for job interviews. I doubt they'll bother to look at your credit history unless they specifically say so on the job listing.

    All you need to include for your education is the graduating year and the major (which you can also flub). No need to include how long it took to get it. Also, never tell them your age until they actually hire you.

    I just found this thread and I have to say I'm very pleased that the top posts encouraged lying. As long as you don't go as far as say... lying about being a doctor or an architect, it's fine. Just make sure you keep track of your lies and keep up the persona for the first month or so of the job.

    • MirrorMadness [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      yeah this is right. Make up the fact that you freelanced doing something that you actually know how to do, then sell yourself on the business that you built as "business development." There's like a 1% chance that they investigate whether your business actually existed. Further, feel free to mention that you have customers from that time who would be happy to vouch for you, and then either use friends/family to pretend for you or ask around chapo dot chat, I'm sure plenty of us can help.

      I'd only clarify that I'd stay away from any sort of sick family member talk. An employment lawyer did an AMA on here a few weeks ago and stated, pointed blank, every employer hates pregnant women. They don't want to hire people with sick families because you might miss work. I'd exaggerate the dates on the CV, and add a section about your freelancing company that you started [Year when your experience stops] to [Present], so it looks like you're currently employed.