Separation Agreement

Posted October 1, 2026

I was laid off in January 2024 at 53 after 30 years in tech.  I was old enough to be disposable and still too young to stop needing a paycheck.  What a delightful little age bracket.

This is my separation agreement. When I signed it, I thought I was leaving one company. Now, I’m pretty sure I was leaving my entire corporate career.

That seems like something that should’ve been mentioned before I signed. I would’ve read it more carefully.

It honestly didn’t occur to me that I might not get another job. I was worried about how long it would take, sure. But I’d been working in tech for thirty years. I thought that would help. 

Apparently, I should’ve spent some of those years being younger.

I didn’t choose to retire. I wasn’t finished working. My bills weren’t finished either, although I did appreciate their confidence in me. Nobody has believed in my earning potential quite like my mortgage company.

So I kept applying. I kept having to explain that, yes, I could still do the work I’d been doing for years.  Apparently, thirty years of experience is impressive right up until somebody does the math on how old you’d have to be to have it. 

I was somehow experienced enough to be overqualified and too old to be worth training. I’m not sure when I was supposed to acquire thirty years of experience and still be twenty-seven, but I apologize for fucking up the timeline.

When I signed it, I thought I was between jobs. I didn’t know I might be on the other side of my career.

The hard part is that I didn’t know I was signing the end of anything bigger than that job. I knew finding another job might take a while. I didn’t think I’d need to figure out who I was going to be if I never found one. Nearly three years later, I’m wondering whether I already had my last day in tech and didn’t even know enough to be sad about it.  Apparently, I missed my own retirement. I hope there was cake.

The part I don’t know what to do with is how much I miss a life that wore me out.  I thought being that exhausted was just what happened when you had a career. It didn’t occur to me that I was allowed to have a problem with it. But I miss knowing where I belonged. I miss being able to answer “What do you do?” without having to explain what happened to me.

That’s a hell of a thing to get from a separation agreement. They could decide they were finished with me. I still had to figure out what the hell I was supposed to do with myself.

I wish I could look at this and say they did me a favor. That would make a lovely story. Unfortunately, I still need a paycheck, and personal growth has been a real asshole about covering its share of the bills.

I don’t know whether this really is the last document I’ll ever sign as a corporate employee. I do know I’ve spent nearly three years trying to get back into a life I’m still recovering from.