Susie Bailey has probably spent more time at home in the past six weeks than she has in the last 31 years. Bailey was 18 when she started working at the local textile plant. She said she was there all of the time, but that all ended in July when the plant closed.
"All these years, I struggled there for nothing," she said.
WRAL first met Bailey a month ago when she was learning how to write a resume.
"I see now that I should have tried to get into something different to better myself," Bailey said.
Bailey is one of thousands of textile workers in the state that have lost their jobs in the past 15 years. This year, 25 textile plants have closed and nearly 10,000 workers have been laid off.
Bailey said she has applied for several jobs and just landed one. On Wednesday, she will go to Murdoch in Butner to be a health technician. She said she is very optimistic about her new life.
"I want to try to go on with my life," she said. "I always look up. I try to be very strong."
Bailey said she sometimes made $40,000 a year at the textile plant by working a lot of overtime. Her new job will only pay half of that, but she said she is grateful to finally have found something.
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