Hi there, John,
I'm sorry to hear your news.
I was made redundant at the age of 57 (I suspect it was partly because I'd been a bit too outspokenly critical of some of the top people's pet projects!). I survived, but I found looking for new employment very disheartening. It didn't help that the staff in the local Job Centre were mostly in their early twenties and gave the impression they'd never had a 'proper job'! I opted to start drawing my company pension when I was made redundant so I never received any unemployment benefit - the only benefit I got was twelve months exemption from National Insurance.
Eventually, after a few odd-jobs for a couple of years, my old firm found they were short of staff and invited me back as a 'temporary systems engineer' on a contract with 1 week's notice on either side. They paid me what I'd been on when I left, plus cost-of-living rises, which I thought was quite fair. Not everyone has that sort of lucky break! I worked in that role for almost a year but I'd moved house in the meantime so eventually I resigned.
It is a big change and re-adjustment, especially if it is unexpected, and it's important that you keep up your morale. I suggest that you have a project in the workshop that you can turn to and succeed at when you encounter the inevitable dark moments. In my case, it wasn't in the workshop - I started a succession of Open University courses and became B.Sc (Hons) at the age of 67.