Career change after a layoff, where to begin?

After 8 years as a welding apprentice I am thinking about moving into a different field. It has been a long 18 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 9 months ago, and it got easier once I kept a simple log of every call and form.

You likely have more transferable skills than you think. Write down what you did, not what the job title said.