Career change after a layoff, where to begin? - 2 months and counting

After 17 years as an administrative assistant I am thinking about moving into a different field. It has been a long 22 weeks. I have good customer skills and I am comfortable with spreadsheets. Did you take a pay cut?

Thanks for writing this out. I went through something close to it 2 months ago, and it settled down once I kept a simple log of every call and form.