You've got to learn to avoid telling them that you're unemployed. Best way is to work for yourself. Assign yourself a project, pay yourself in equity, and work on it for a few hours each day. Rehearse telling people about it in such a way that it sounds like a legit job. That will be easier if you take it as seriously as a legit job.
In my case, I was required to relocate from a large east coast city back to my family's home in the rural Midwest, where I perform functions to care for a family circumstance and they take up effectively a full-time job's worth of hours every week. It's all I can do to continue exercising and cooking healthy meals. "Working" a full-time side project that yields no short-term income is wholly and entirely physically intractable in my current situation.
Besides that, it would be very dishonest of me to downplay or fudge the explanation of my current period of unemployment. The family problem has been severe and required me to leave from a job, dedicate huge amount of time and money, and many other sacrifices. The only reason I could consider taking a new job is that the income would allow me to pay for people to take over the care duties I am currently personally performing. So the exact, real reasons for my unemployment are actually very relevant, important things for my next employer to understand and fundamentally be OK with.
Ah, I see. I think that still counts as work. If you've been saying "I've been off work" in interviews, that might not work, but it would be just as true to say "I've been working for my family."
Yes, I do say this. Obviously you can't just vaguely say "I've been working" -- they will ask exactly what "work" you have been doing, which is when I explain just the bare minimum details of my family situation necessary for an employer.
Most people interviewing me express a lot of compassion, say it's admirable to see someone sticking to help their family as I have, and then promptly reject me for not currently being employed.
