does anyone else have a really spotty job history?

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if you go back far enough mine is. I've had the same company for 6 years or so but before then there was a gap and then after 2000 another gap, my pay has been all over the place...it's not great.

More non existant than spotty. I'm 22, graduated from university last june and have a total work history (all voluntary work) of about 9 weeks and thats before I got my degree. On job seekers now but getting a job seems impossible, and after months of contacting various schemes I've only just got back one possible call about some voluntary work, if it even maps out as the last dozen or so places I applied for have never even gotten off the ground.

Throughtout my life I've always been suprising people with my unique skills and abilities. I can critically analyse like no ones buisness, can still remember random facts I read years ago and my visual memory has shown sparks of near genius for remembering even split second events. Yet can I get a job to try and prove I have the ability to do something with my life, no. Heres hoping I catch a break and good luck to everyone else trying to get employed.

I'm 24

At 16, worked in a pizza place slowly going bankrupt. Ended up getting fired for repeatedly upsetting customers. From there I worked at a grocery store, mostly either bagging or pushing shopping carts. This was the jobs given to the "mentally disabled" or Polish-native speakers. Ended up quitting after several spats with supervisors.

Went to college between 2003 and 2007. At the time, I was working in an office doing weather pages for newspapers as an intern on min. wage pay. Aside from the lack of hours and lack of pay, this was pretty nice though repetitive. Had to leave upon graduation.

Over the summers during college, I would work in warehouses just moving around merchandise and stacking them on pallets. Some order selection, which I volunteered for often just to get some variety. Ended up doing one summer at one major retailer's distribution center, a few more at another retailer's.

Once I graduated, I had no idea what to do with myself. So, I tried to get in at the second warehouse for a fourth time. This time around, they had switched to some computerized "personality test" screening potential employees and I bombed it. Wouldn't bother hearing my case, wouldn't return my calls. Never got back.

I ended up becoming a sports writer for a local newspaper collective. Of course the irony about this is - you're supposed to interview coaches post-game, and having AS I rarely do it. But, two and a half years later and still do this part time.

Had another warehouse job, starting Jan 08 and got laid off nine months later. Mostly opening packages, entering information into the computer systems, picking orders and processing outbound shipments. Was called back here two months ago, got fired last week for repeatedly doing things getting products lost or misused. My bosses thought I was dyslexic, denied that, then only after I got fired did I bother to tell them I had AS. That did nothing, but apparently having said something beforehand would have got me into a different position.

So in the last 34 months, I've only had a full time job for 13. The rest has been the newspaper gig, depression, and feeling like a bum. Especially considering in my family, work is the most important thing you can possibly do and work comes before all other things.

Mine is less of a spotty work history, and more like several gigantic boils obscuring the history entirely. I think I knew before I even left school that work was not for me. I just bounced from school to college to unemployment, with a couple of crap jobs jammed in at odd angles. I saved up some money in my last job and then quit that and gave myself a long holiday just doing what I wanted, until the money ran out. Now I'm back on job seekers, and no one's even returning e-mails to reject me, so I know things must be bleak

But recently I found out I have AS, so hopefully that can help me research and plan better for the future.

It sounds bad, but I'd advise all aspies to try and become as frugal and self sufficient as possible, because it seems we go through longer and harder times financially, more often.

I'm 29 and haven't had a job. I'm worried I never will have a job but just the whole writing a CV, sending it off and getting rejected or having to travel somewhere and be interviewed terrifies me. Just the thought of it almost gives me a panic attack.

I have a good BSc in computer science which I got without much effort and thought about continuing down the academic route but all the application processes I looked at required getting references from staff at the university you got your undergraduate degree from and I don't know any because I only really spoke to 2 people with any regularity while I was there and they were both fellow students. I don't want to get even further in debt either.

Life sucks.

I dont have a work history as of yet, mainly because I have yet to enter the work force. Not for lack of trying, though.

My job history bounces around all different types of jobs from content editing to intelligence work to vet nursing and now IT. Employers are kinda freaked out about that but I get bored doing the same thing for too long and have a desire to learn new stuff.

I quit every job I had before this one within 2 weeks of starting. The one I have right now I am forced to keep for 4 months (coop programm with school). If I wasn't I would seriously consider leaving. Seems like such a waste of time to burn my time like this.

My work history has been spotty as well, with doing several temp or even seasonal jobs right after college, then I got hired briefly at a grocery store that had been remodeling a couple of locations, but was laid off when their old employees had been able to return to that store. It was also early in this recession, so it took me over a year before I got my current job, but even there I've had my hours cut to where it's a good week if I work 6 hours.

No job history whatsoever, but managed to finish my one BA degree requirement 15 years after I dropped out.

I've been fired from various places for various reasons, mostly people related, and getting overly concerned about who thinks what about me. Sucks, but I hope over the years I've gotten better, and if start taking more upscale work, maybe I'll work about nicer people.

Me. Until I found out about AS I just thought I hadn't found the right fit, etc. Never ever crossed my mind that it was *me* Here is my job history, I'm now 31. I am good on a till and an excellent recordkeeper/typist as long as its not a high traffic store.

13-15 - worked for dad pt in the summers, hated it

15-17 - first real job, pt grocery clerk, fired
pt fast food worker, fired
pt waitress, quit to move

17-18 - pt waitress at small restaurant, quit to move again
pt fast food worker, quit overwhelmed
pt daycare, quit overwhelmed

18-20 - went away to college right after graduating high school. I worked full time at a slow gas station during off times. During school times I was a pt retail clerk and pt waitress. I held several volunteer positions on campus and my work apparently fell short of expectations in every one of them. I really struggled in college and did not understand why.

20-22 - ft at the same gas station finally left when new owner came and changed things
concurrently pt retail clerk, don't remember why this ended, then pt hostess, laid off but really they wanted someone else in the position
pt home health care, quit overwhelmed
pt kiosk manager, fired
pt retail clerk, manager was mean to me and I remember crying at work and quitting
pt at another gas station while pregnant, quit when baby was born. This phase of my life I worked multiple jobs at a time and had several romantic relationships, maybe a period of mania or something, I have never been able to replicate it.

23-25 - sold stuff on ebay and babysat

25-26 - pt work at coffee shop, fired because I could not learn the drinks
pt retail clerk, fired

26-28 - ft work at daycare, quit due to boss doing illegal things
ft work at another daycare, quit for same reason

28 - pt waitress, slow morning shift, quit due to pregnancy complications
pt retail sales, fired for God only knows what, I LOVED this job

29-31 - pt work at a daycare, still working
delivery route, fired

Only 5 of these jobs lasted a year, mostly just a few weeks/months.

Sorry that was long, it was really interesting for me to type it all out though and see the patterns.

If I were to type out a full resume with all my work history it would be about as thick as the phone book... and i'm only 23. But in my own defense i've never been fired but i'm one of those as*holes who'll quite after less than 90 days because i'm "not being challenged enough" or because of "schedualing conflicts"... like my last job in retail...

great job don't get me wrong but i'm a creature of habit for better or worse so when my schedual is 8-4 9-6 12-9 1-10 7-3... yeah f*ck off. With that kind of schedual I end up in the ER and have to quit regardless of how nice my co-workers are... and they rarely ever understand... why does everyone take it personally when you quit?

I agree about retail schedules. I need to be able to plan my life pretty much the same every week or its a no go for me. I would not survive a rotating shift. Once I had an overnight job and I only lasted two days. I didn't include that one on my previous post. forgot about it

My "career" started around the time when i was 20.

I had no education, no training, no previous experience, and what did i do? I walked into a large international corporation and started coding databases. It was a 6 month trial job in which the employer was supposed to hire after, but they did not. I think it has something to do with me not looking people in the eye, and not being "forward" enough to ask for a job.

I've had several jobs since then, VB Programmers, Application developer, Hardware repair, Network tech, Systems engineer, Security software developer, Teacher, Content Management consultant, but most of them died out because of my lack of social skills - and frankly, being bored by 99% of the work i did did not help at all.

Now i got a new job with a better employer than before, i have my own apartment - and i can actually see a future this time.

I graduated high-school in summer of 2001. After graduation I started working with LRS(Louisiana Rehabilitation Services) because I was born with a rare vision disorder that was not diagnosed till my senior year of HS. LRS sent me to a training center for people with vision problems to learn life-skills & other stuff for 6 months. After completion I thought I wanted a job repairing computers & I took a coarse in A+ certification but I did not understand any of it & I did not have the motor skills to be doing it. After that I decided to start looking for a job.

I did not get my 1st job till the beginning of 2005 witch was a dish-washer. I hated the job but an agency I was working with that was helping me find a job lined it up for me. I took it because I had no work history or experience so no one wanted to take a chance on me. I had been putting in job apps every couple weeks at places & I had been looking for a couple years & having no luck & not even one interview.

After 10 months of that around end of 2005; I quit because I got a job at WalMart. I was originally hired to do stocking but I had problems with that because of my vision & my motor skills so they transferred me to maintenance after a couple days. Maintenance was a shorter term for floor-maintenance & was cleaning floors & doing special projects. I had problems in the beginning but I did well after a while because my supervisor & some of my coworkers saw me trying & wer willing to work with me. After two years around the end of 2007 I had to quit WalMart because of problems with management. We had a contract crew helping us out but shortly after I quit; the department disappeared & the contract crew took over full-time. I feel like management forced me out because I would of had problems working in other departments & management did not want to get in trouble for discrimination over firing me.

After I left WalMart I started looking for work again & my next job was a custodian in a sporting-goods/outdoors store. I started at the end of summer in 2008. I did not feel safe doing certain aspects of the job because I have tremor problems at times & a lot of the job was tossing trash & I was worried about cutting myself on the box-cutter & other things. I started seeing a neurologist to try to gt my tremors under control but the 1st med made me very sick & I felt like I was having a stroke while at work so I went home. The docs never told me what it was & after being out for two weeks; I was basically fired because of company policy. I had only been there a couple months. They said they would take me back if I reapplied but I could not get the tremors under control & the meds made me very sick. I also ran up a lot of debt cuz of medical bill(that I'm still paying off) so I quit treatment. I have not worked sense. I've been working with LRS & another agency trying to find a job but most of the jobs here are off-shore in the oil-field like welding, truck-driver, rigger ect & I cant do stuff like that so my options are limited here. I'm on Social Security Disability & I really felt better while I was working but I'm not sure what I can do reasonably well here. I graduatedl in 2001 & I only have about 38 months of work experience in three jobs so I do have spotty work history