Process To Become An Older Teacher

Hopefully someone has an answer for this question.

I have a close friend who has been out of the job market for about 10 yrs due to the fact that they had to take care of a family member who had a terminal illness. When they first started taking care of this family member they thought it would only be about a year or two but it ended up being 10 yrs of a situation where they had to be a 24/7 care giver for someone who had no capacity to take care of themselves.

Well the person's family member has passed away and my friend is of course looking to getting back into the workforce and was interested in possibly going into teaching. He has a bachelors (finance/marketing) and masters degree (business) he got before he had to start caring for his family member.

My questions are:

With such a big work gap is getting into teaching even a possibility or is it just a pipe dream for him?

One big obstacle I keep hearing about is that when applying schools require a number of professional references....for the past 10 yrs this person was not really in contact with many people since they were a 24/7 care giver and never really got out to do other things except to go to doctor appts. and all the other things required to be a 24/7 care giver. So how would they ever be able to get professional reference if they can't even get a job without them?

Any information is appreciated.

I should also mention so if it makes a difference but this individual is 50 yrs old.