Nate,
      After, and while you're going through the exercise of applying to these places, please keep us apprised of how they treat you during the process. I've had a few hi-tech jobs in my time. Getting in the door often requires an inside connection with someone or an introductory, "pay your dues" stint as a temp worker through an agency - without medical insurance. It can be a bit of a three ring circus, having to deal with the characters you'll have to suffer through. It's like Shakespeare said: "All the worlds's a stage". Everyone turns out with their best "stock theater" costuming/attire to play up their assigned roles....often to the hilt. It's almost as if, they really don't give a damn about you; you're just a soundboard with mirror in place of your face. Everyone gets such a thrill from a playback of their performance, listening to themselves talk.
 Hopefully, you'll fare well dealing with it. I live in the heartland of hi-tech America, inbetween routes 128 and 495 - the river Styx hee hee! - just outside Boston -  I know what it's like around here! The competition is fierce
 You're young and strong with some good experience. You may get something right away in the mid-west. Around here, people tend to "leapfrog" or "piggyback" from one company to another, following their friends and connections around. I remember getting a quailty control job once simply by virtue of the fact that a good friend of mine - that I worked with at another company - worked in the department. He specifically requested that he wanted to work with me to his / our boss. Having absolutely no credentials to qualify for the postion, if I had walked in off the street and applied, I never would have even been a remote consideration. Yet I was the guy they hired. It took me an entire year to learn everything I had to to work independently in that department. Nonetheless I'm thankful that I was hired and it was a good learning experience! Most importantly though, I learned as much about the machinations of the corporate world as I did quality control.
I remember during my stint at that company, human resources was purging its files of the thousands upon thousands of resumes it had collected for just one job requisition that had been posted. They they were, piled up in a dumpster. I'd pick up handfuls of them and leaf through them in utter amazement. People from all over the entire country with incredible job histories and educational credentials, all going after the same job at a comparative no name company in Massachusetts.
 I find it interesting that we, with our medical conditions, may have a difficult time landing a job - even with our experience -  but that a friend of mine, who is now 50 years old and has been in the reserves for over 20 years, has been shipped off to the Middle East in spite of his age and the fact that he's had radical back surgery - spinal fusion - and is in pain every day. Well, it would seem that if you qualify as "cannon fodder" that makes it all okay!
 Nate, don't be afraid to cultivate your own business as you have been doing anyway. Your wife may have to be the one that lands the job with the health insurance for the family. There's nothing wrong with that if you can build up your business. A good friend of mine that I played in a band with is a highly talented graphic artist and silk screen expert. He works out of his house and has high level accounts - including the NFL - all over the world. I was in a band with him and his wife who is a very talented vocalist. They stopped buying health insurance - wihich costs over $1000 per/month for a family plan - and replaced it with the insurance his wife was getting as a cafeteria worker for the school system.  She got the job solely to obtain the benefits.
  Take Care,   Paul
