I couldn't survive retail and working with the public, so I started doing what some artist and musician friends of mine had done to pay the bills: self employed domestic cleaning. Yes, it's not glamorous, and yes it's hard work. But the upsides I'm grateful for is that I'm my own boss, I work for a set roster of clients, and if I can't stand someone I can quit that one customer and find someone nicer to show up for every week. Another upside is that it's ideal when the home owners are never at home because they are out working themselves. I get to be all alone to do my work and then let myself out.
The work is boring, tedious, repetitive and often physically grinding and tiring. There's no pension and no paid sick days or paid vacation time. If you don't work you don't get paid. But the trade off is no boss per se, no public contact, you get to choose your customers who become your set appointments, no co-workers, no management, no set timetables just make sure you do the hours you've promised and are being paid for, and no having to take the job home with you. You're in a different place every day although within a rotation of places. But it's nice not to feel trapped into the same environment. No weekends, no evenings.
I wouldn't actually recommend it as I don't love it, but I like it far better than a conventional workplace which I will never try again, not even if wild horses dragged me there. I am also, however, getting increasingly tired. Physically I can't go on. Mentally I find it hard to get out in the morning and I'm starting to have panic attacks. Frankly I'd LOVE to go on disability just because I badly need a break physically and mentally. But I won't put myself through the bureacratic hoops this country makes you jump through, as even my spell on plain old dole was humiliating enough.
I have a new Cafepress-style venture I've just launched, but I don't want to jinx it by talking it up as it's only just begun. But if it takes off at all, it may be the answer to my prayers for a new and better way to pay the bills. I'm desperate to find something different to do, and the UK has just raised the state pension retirement age for my generation to 67. I can't retire until I'm sixty bloody 7. That's nearly 70. I could be dead by then and never knew what it felt like to get to retire at last.