While recovering from her own job loss, Christy Layden was tired of opening LinkedIn and seeing post after post about being fired.
The 45-year-old Frisco, Texas, resident was a senior e-commerce and fulfillment manager at a major retailer before being forced out of her job in early 2025. And she says she watched others in her network lose their jobs every day.
“It’s become a recurring theme,” she told CNBC Make It. “I’m sure other people would have posted about it, even if it wasn’t someone I knew directly.”
Companies have announced more than 1.2 million layoffs in 2025, the highest annual total since 2020 and the seventh highest since 1989, according to global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The job cuts announced in January reached the highest level since 2009.
Glassdoor researchers wrote in November that “permanent layoffs” are coming, referring to smaller but more common layoffs as opposed to large and rare layoffs. They added that rolling layoffs could “create a culture of anxiety, anxiety and resentment”. For those who have lost their jobs, an economy with fewer jobs and fewer layoffs makes it even more difficult to find new jobs.
After more than a year of fruitless job hunting, Layden said she decided to go back to school to become a nurse. Health care job openings are supporting the job market as other industries lag behind job growth. Employment of registered nurses in particular is projected to grow by 5% from 2024 to 2034, higher than the average of 3% for all occupations, according to recently available data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Layden says her career change stemmed from her fascination with nursing and away from the instability and outdated norms of the corporate world. “I wasn’t allowed to be who I was,” she said, adding that she felt that speaking up or questioning decisions, for example, was often frowned upon. “It wasn’t a fun environment for me.”
I want to do a job that cannot be replaced.
When Layden lost her job, she didn’t immediately decide to pursue a career in nursing. She had previous experience in product management and was looking for more of the same. But she says she hasn’t seen any results and estimates she sent out more than 250 applications over a year. The recruitment process took about 25 days.
“I remember thinking in the beginning that if I didn’t have a job after six months, something must be wrong,” she says. “And six months have passed.”
She cast a wider net to include project and program management roles, and at one point, she says, even tried two services that used AI to fill roles on her behalf. However, they were often applied to roles that required more technical experience than she had or that she would not have chosen on her own.
About a year into the search, Leyden said she was exhausted, wondering, “How on earth is this happening and why has it been going on for so long?”
Many other job seekers in the United States are similarly struggling with long-term unemployment. About 27.3% of unemployed Americans, or more than 1.9 million people, had been looking for work for more than six months as of June, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Prolonged job searches can take a toll professionally, emotionally, and financially. That took away Layden’s interest and motivation, she said. “I can’t do this anymore,” she remembers thinking, “but I have to do it.”
She says she relied on her parents’ help to get by while looking for a job, selling jewelry and handbags to get extra money and cashing out her 401(k).
Rayden wanted to get out of his rut and decided to change direction. Personal experiences influenced her nursing choices. Layden has gotten Botox and fillers and is currently most interested in becoming a nurse anesthetist or an injectable nurse in the aesthetic field.
Nursing also seemed like a more resilient profession to Leyden than the one from which she and her colleagues were laid off, she said. Many highly skilled healthcare roles are considered to be some of the safest from the risk of being replaced by AI.
“I’m confident that what I plan to do will never be replaced,” she says. When it comes to “putting needles in your face or having surgery,” you “need someone to do it for you,” she says.
“It’s going to be a pretty long journey.”
Layden started the accelerated online program on Monday and said she was excited to learn and “tap into another side” of her brain.
She said she took out loans to pay for her education, received tuition assistance from her family, and is looking for remote part-time jobs such as virtual assistant or data entry to cover other expenses. She says not having children or a family to support made the decision easier, but she wished she had pursued nursing sooner.
She plans to attend nursing school for approximately the next two years. Although she can’t turn back the clock, she says she wants to work in nursing, at least until she retires.
“I’m basically starting from scratch and I’m not getting any younger,” she says. “It’s going to be quite a long journey.”
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