At 53, she quit sales and learned to breathe

quit at – Nicole Cicero, a 54-year-old sales representative in New Jersey, quit her IT staffing sales job in February after nearly 15 years. Managing burnout, menopause symptoms, and a changing workplace culture, she built a multi-month exit plan, lowered expenses, and

Nicole Cicero was standing in her old routine, and it had started to choke her.

After a company acquisition changed the culture and values where she’d worked for nearly 15 years. she found herself struggling to get out of bed in the morning. She would procrastinate to log in, even while knowing it was hurting her performance. To spare her clients from seeing she wasn’t okay, she would “kind of blow them off.”.

By the time menopause and its hormonal changes arrived—along with hair loss—her work life and mental stability were no longer separating cleanly. Cicero. a sales representative in New Jersey. says she couldn’t do the work emotionally and that it disrupted her mental stability in a way she hadn’t experienced before.

“It hit me,” she said, “especially as I’m getting older, that time is precious.”

In February, she quit her IT staffing sales job. She was 53 at the time, and she had two teenagers at home—one who is 12 and another who is 15—so the decision wasn’t just personal. She was the breadwinner and the mother responsible for the family’s financial steadiness.

Before she left, Cicero stopped living on autopilot at work and began building a way out that her finances could survive.

Her exit plan started with spending cuts. She lowered her expenses and earned extra money while still employed. Months before leaving, she negotiated her phone, cable, and home insurance bills to lower her overall costs. She also sold household items on Facebook Marketplace and took on a brand deal on social media with a hair care line.

“It was scary,” she said, because she knew that even with a new sales job, she wouldn’t have a portfolio or recurring commission to rely on the way she had before. She says she was burning at both ends, trying to generate any extra money she could.

At the same time, she was setting boundaries—because the next job needed to fit her life, not erase it.

Cicero devised a list of what mattered most in her next role: work-life balance, finances, and the sense that her ethics and morals align. She targeted smaller companies rather than big ones with a lot of red tape, and she leaned on the contacts she’d built over years.

She didn’t flood the market with applications. While still working at her old job, she applied to fewer than 10 companies. She used her network and a professional recruiter she’d known for decades. She says she didn’t submit her résumé online or apply through any job postings.

She ultimately chose a company where she already knew someone from the past. To her, it felt like a comfortable choice—somewhere she could walk in and “just breathe.”

Starting over at 53, she said, required a mindset shift.

Her advice for older job hunters is to walk into interviews with confidence, telling themselves: “I know what I can do. I’ve been there, done that, and I know how to do this job.” She credits that mental change as something she has embodied in her 50s.

Cicero also says boundaries can do the hard work for you. If a company can’t meet them, she believes you’ll find one that can.

She argues that companies aren’t only looking for the newest graduates. She says they want someone who can problem-solve, use life and work experiences to navigate different situations, and bring a fresh perspective.

When she gave notice at her old job, she felt the pressure lift. She describes it as going from suffocating to being able to breathe again.

She also says the strain showed up in her business at the end of her previous role. Her clients could tell she was under stress—or, at the very least, not at her best—and she believes that affected her work.

In her new job, she says she’s attracting better clients and business because she likes who she is again. She describes the feeling as rejuvenating, like she did in her 20s and 30s. When a client meets her now. she believes they’re going to want to buy from her—“it’s euphoric. ” supported by a team she says is great.

But the transition hasn’t been smooth.

Cicero is on a commission plan, and right now she has no commissions at the moment because she is new and currently working on bringing in new customers. She’s stressed about building up a new portfolio.

She also had a client fall through recently, and she says it threw her for a loop. She has to remind herself that she did what she could, and that all she can do is try to reel that customer back in. She expects business may be slow while she goes through “growing pains.”

The biggest emotional challenge, she says, is identity loss.

At her last job, she was “somebody big” for 14 years, with a title, a reputation, and clients who trusted her and became friends. Then, she says, it was overnight: “nobody is calling, and nobody needs me.”

Now she’s starting from scratch. At 54, she says the age message in her head hits differently—“You’re too old for this”—even though leaving was what she needed for her sanity and health.

Nobody warned her, she says, that starting over at 53 wouldn’t just empty her bank account—it would mess with her mind.

Still, she keeps pushing forward, staying positive and “manifesting success.” She offers an example of how she tries to reframe her spending: instead of saying “I can’t afford it” anymore, she’ll buy something anyway to manifest the fact that income will be there.

She stresses that changing jobs isn’t selfish. She’s doing it for herself and, she says, setting an example for her kids.

One of the most visible changes is in their day-to-day: she has to tell her kids they can’t DoorDash as much food as they used to because she started over. But she adds that her children are watching her get up every morning, change out of her sweatpants, and go to work to handle this change.

Cicero believes that this is one reason people in their 50s stay in careers they’re unhappy with—they don’t want to start over again. Her message is simple: believe in yourself and take the first step.

In her view, it’s never too late to change. It isn’t selfish, and change can make you a better person for your family.

One job decision turned her life upside down in February. Now, in her words, she’s learning to breathe again—supported by a new routine, a new team, and the hard work of rebuilding what the old title once made automatic.

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