Career slightly broken

Hi all, 

 
Throwaway account for obvious reasons. Really appreciate any thoughtful responses or follow up questions.

I grew up in a toxic and abusive home environment. Working hard to escape this background got me into a top target school where I was first exposed to finance careers. But while studying and trying to start my career I was unfortunately dealing with undiagnosed and untreated complex ptsd stemming from various childhood experiences. 

I was pretty messed up, didn't do well in the job market and graduated without a job offer or having completed any internships despite plenty of interviews. 

My career since then has included a masters degree, boutique IB sell side experience and buy side experience at smaller funds. But my experience jumps around and I am out of sync with the standard path for career progression so that I'm not experienced enough for mid-senior roles and too far out of school for junior roles. There are also big gaps including a currently ongoing gap, so if you start counting from when I graduated and add together my years of experience there are multiple years missing, all of which were spent job hunting.

The first gap started after I graduated. While I have good reasons for why the two most recent gaps began - an immigration issue and Covid - I don’t have a good reason for why they lasted so long.

I have consistently been very bad at converting interviews into offers, early on this was because I was a mixed up kid and came across as such. More recently my resume raises questions that put me on the defensive and crafting a coherent story has been difficult. I would prefer to confidently own my experiences in interviews but my impulse in the past has been to not make excuses and I also definitely want to keep things professional and avoid words like ‘abusive’ or ‘ptsd’.

After a years-long recovery process I want to draw a line under this uneven start and my current job search. I would really appreciate input on:

- how to place my career on a stronger trajectory generally  

- how to address my path so far in interviews

In the past I have landed interviews at hedge funds and IBs, though currently not much is happening. 

And to anyone else dealing with tough times or their own mental health, invest time in yourself and in relationships with people you trust and seek help, things will get better. Even though finding a job is currently a drag, my life now is far better than it was previously, for which I am 1000x grateful. 

Covering some basic questions: 

- my bachelors and masters are from strong target Ivy League schools in rigorous finance-related majors. GPAs are ok and meet the requirements for front office finance roles. I also have decent extracurriculars; sports captain, nonprofit leadership etc. 
- coping with a stressful finance job - I am well practiced at performing under stress given the environment I grew up in. One of my main goals is to find a role that challenges me sufficiently.
- ‘just take any job’ - I am open to various opportunities, but in the past I ended up accepting roles out of necessity that were a bad fit, which has hurt my career. 

- healthwise, I have worked with counselors and, while there’s always room for improvement, for what it’s worth I am probably as well adjusted now as the average person working in front office finance.

- current activities: self study filling in gaps in financial modeling experience, sports/working out and job hunting.