I can empathize with you GX... I was laid off as well following the economic crash, a few years ago. It really hurt, and hadnt bought a coin since. Havent sold off.anything I consider "nice". cant bring myself to do that, but I have sold some duplicates.
Fortunately, my wife has a steady (but underpaid) job in state government paper pushing, so I tend to my now 5 year old, and have slowly built up a part time business working at home over the magic of the internet. The work comes and goes, and in the meantime i have painted the majority of the inside of my house, and done a little remodeling, done a lot of landscaping, fixed our cars, etc... but at the end of the month, well, lets just say if i want to stay married, I dont buy overpriced russian coins!
I still enjoy taking out my collection, admiring the nice ones, re-organizing my trays, and of course keeping them all clean and shiny, especially the 18th c. silver ones, they really shine up nice with a buffing wheel and polish ..
I still stalk ebay and the auctions for the dream coins to fill my empty spaces in my trays..... . you never know! plus the hunt is still half the fun, isnt it?
meanwhile.....