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.

  • Bedandsofa [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    The way I would frame it is that you had no five year gap in employment. Put a few years worth of odd jobs on there (like the PC repair), that can’t really be verified. A gap of year or less is fine, just say you traveled on money you saved working those jobs if they ask. Maybe you taught English abroad. Commit to and internalize the story.

    Also strongly recommend you structure your resume around skills/competencies and not jobs in chronological order.. That’s totally acceptable and even a preferred way of doing it for a lot of jobs. You should know your backstory in chronological order, but you don’t need to present it as such.