RN Seeking Work after staying home with children

[GraceTW]

Hello everyone! I am posting to you all to see if I could get some advice to relay to my mother, the nurse. Before I was born, she was a Critical Care RN, but she gave up her career in order to raise me and my sisters. It has been 22 years since she was last employed, and she did not maintain her license while she was a stay at home mom. She has since gone to school and gotten her license back, but is having a hard time locating a position since she has spent so much time out of the field. I keep telling her not to take it personally, that I am sure it takes a little bit of time to get back into the swing of things and that is why the employers are hesitant, but I can tell it is really difficult for her to see jobs being given to other applicants when back in the day, she had her choice of hospitals and (so she says, I don't doubt her) was very very good at what she did. So I suppose that's my first question, what should I say to make her feel better?

Then I feel like there are vultures all over the place trying to get her to sign up for a lot of expensive classes for certifications which are, to me, more of a way for the school or individual running the program to make money. I am sure some of them can be useful in some situations, but one in particular reeked of a scam (which I later confirmed through some sleuthing) and many of the others also seem like the type of classes that, if an employer were interested in having someone with that license, they would pay for them to attend the education. My completely uneducated opinion is that all the education she wants right now won't overcome the fact that she has no recent hours under her belt, but do any of you experts know of legitimate courses that might help her become a more attractive applicant?

Finally, and most importantly, I am trying to find some creative solutions for her to have some hours to list on her application. I signed her up for the red cross volunteer program and indicated on the application that she would mainly be interested in work as an RN. (I didn't include the explanation, but I don't think volunteering in another capacity will help her lack of recent experience on applications) I will spend a little while longer looking at these boards for ideas and also picking my own brain, but I would love to hear from all of you! What should I suggest to her to help her get back into the game? I know there are some jobs available which she found to be unappealing in comparison to her passion-critical care, and I am tempted to advise her to just take A job, ANY job, and that once she is working again, she can work her way back up to her old level. I am sure it won't be a quick process, but I also doubt it would take the same amount of time as it did for her when she was working up from being a recent graduate. I don't know if volunteer work might set her back a little less than some of the jobs she found available, since I don't know all the different specialties and what is considered to be a more advanced position versus a less advanced one, or if that is even something that is influential in the nursing world.

I will say so far that I found her a professional resume writing service, which I think will help, and encouraged her to not immediately brush off the traveling jobs. We are in a very military dense area, and I know that positions are available to travel to the middle east, which pay extremely well. It's hard for me, because I so want to help her, but I know nothing about the ins and outs of seeking employment in the health care industry. Thus, I come to the collective wisdom of this website. Thank you so much to everyone for the knowledge I have already received from the archives, and I look forward to hearing yall's advice on my sticky situation. I have my reading glasses on!!!