I have just a question for you, How long did it take to loose Half of your 401K? The DOW hasn't even dropped in half, so that doesn't make sense to me unless you have it in the riskiest of funds, at being in your 50's there is no way you should be doing that. You should have it mixed around, but in the more conservative funds. I watch my husband's 401K and do all the stuff with it, and when the market started going south, we immediately put it into conservative funds, it's hard to watch it loose 900 in one day, and over a weeks time, (last week) we lost over $3,000 but, then just Monday, it went back up $1,300... It is all a gamble, but you have to be smart about it too, and educate yourself on what to do.