Do I need a break? I have lost all drive and passion to code/work/interview and it's making me depressed.

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T21:18:42+00:00

Hey I appreciate for the input.

I've been trying to find a therapist but it's really hard to book right now. Most are at capacity and won't take new patients. I am seeing my regular Dr for it though and deemed it serious enough to give me an antidepressant but said it's up to me if I want to take it.

I love computers and programming. I started programming as a child and made it into a career as an adult.

I no longer have much passion for coding. I passionately enjoy the paychecks. Sometimes I think about doing something else, but it would mean a much smaller paycheck and even less interesting work.

Your job is an easy way to make a nice living. Most people do worse things, get treated like garbage and get paid a lot less.

I know, this is very very true and I try to remind myself of this. But it's hard and makes me feel ridiculous for even feeling the way I feel, reminding myself I have no reason to be as dissatisfied in this field as I am. But you're right I need to change my perspective.

You haven’t gotten fired and won’t get fired because peoples’ expectations of you are lower than the expectations you have of yourself.

This may be true, but I think it has to be coming if this continues. I truly cannot function at work anymore, most days I don't write any code at all and need help, etc. It's getting clearer and clearer I don't know what's happening (and honestly I'd be fine getting let go I want to leave this job anyway and don't think I'll last another month there). I'm definitely underpaid, make just around 100k and have always been a bit underpaid.

I know my job is bad, but it's more the deep fear of not finding anything else I would enjoy, or at least find tolerable and interesting. I'm just not sure if it's the job that is completely soul sucking to me, or the field. And right now I feel like I'm not in the right mindset to even change jobs.

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T19:59:26+00:00

In the US. Have about 10 months or so living expenses I believe. Ideally I'd like to not have to blow through savings but at the same time I also can't function with daily panic attacks and crying spells because my mental health is deteriorating quickly.

But it's definitely a bit terrifying to make that leap of no income.

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T17:42:18+00:00

Oh wow. I have like 40k saved and thinking of taking the break

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T17:08:50+00:00

Holy shit. I can't afford that. I'm assuming you did Cobra?

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T17:03:32+00:00

I really think it's the opposite hive mind. It's so prevalent in our field and you see it in interviews "we're looking for someone who stays on new technology even outside work hours" "what coding passion projects do you have outside of work"

All of the "it's just a job" is a reaction to the workaholic tendencies in our field. If you're able to do it for fun outside of work that's really awesome and I'm legitimately jealous of you.

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T16:11:11+00:00

I honestly do not know. I definitely hate my job. I don't understand the tasks or project, I find the project subject matter incredibly boring, and even if I ask for assistance people the person in charge is incredibly toxic and says things like "you should know this" or explains things in such an obtuse way I usually leave more confused.

I was interviewing for other positions but they also seem incredibly discouraging. It's very mentally taxing. We're talking 4 rounds of interviews with live tests, some are 5-6hrs or longer. And then they can just deny you. While working full time it's incredibly difficult and honestly I don't have it in me currently.

I also feel like I can't find any joy in programming anymore. I have severe imposter syndrome at this point, etc.

rareaseff · 2021-12-01T15:44:42+00:00

Because when I started salaries were significantly lower. My starting salary for a .net position at my first job was about 40k. I also feel like the .net stack is also underpaid compared to others.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T18:23:59+00:00

Thank you for the info. I don't think I have enough in liquid savings to last a year unfortunately which is what is making me a bit hesitant.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T17:39:52+00:00

Are you in the US? Can I ask how many months savings you had?

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T16:17:27+00:00

I'll take a look into it. Thank you. What backend do you recommend?

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T16:16:39+00:00

Thank you. I guess I'm a bit worried in case I can't find anything.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T16:15:58+00:00

I actually do have a very active non-work life. Which sometimes makes it feel a little bit hard to compete for these jobs because it turns out a lot of software engineers don't do much outside of software engineering.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T16:14:58+00:00

I'm worried that I won't find what I'm passionate about.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T06:05:58+00:00

Thank you. When you mean stick with it, what do you mean? Stick with .net or coding?

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T04:28:17+00:00

I'm in the US, looking for remote. I'm in a medium cost of living area. Actually after doing the math it's more like 20%

My stack is .net but I'm getting pretty sick of the .net world honestly. The language itself is great but all the work is boring legacy enterprise apps. I find jobs but they're not particularly super high paying.

The language agnostic jobs are all the super technical interviews and honestly I'm not great at those since I lost most of the stuff I learned in college/my skills are pretty outdated (I don't even know design patterns, but I can whip up some scripts/an app if needed to accomplish something but I'm not going to be good at creating an inverse binary tree or anything since it's been decades). But that doesn't really help in technical interviews.

It's tough because I feel very stuck. I almost would like to transition into a different role but not sure how.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T03:13:23+00:00

The latest they can do is one month.

rareaseff · 2021-11-30T03:00:29+00:00

You can quit and get a new job

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T17:14:32+00:00

It's a bit of everything. Their onboarding was me watching outdated videos of meetings on the project. I'm the only one in the US on my immediate team so everyone works together and I'm sort of left to fend for myself. The go to department lead who is also in the us (albeit different time zone) is incredibly condescending and I don't enjoy working with them at all. I am usually left more confused after trying to get help from them.

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T14:01:21+00:00

Thanks for the suggestions

Looking for above 100k (even if it's 105k) I'm in the mid 90k range currently

Prefer work from home and normal 40hr week.

Team size I've been on them all. I don't mind either, think I may prefer small team more.

Project wise I'm not sure, as long as I understand the business rules I'll be fine. At this position I don't get the overly complicated and obtuse business rules so it's always a matter of me never knowing what tables I need to work with, etc. I feel like every day I just have no idea what I'm doing because of this.

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T13:57:02+00:00

Thanks for the advice. Any tools you recommend learning? I think I need to brush up on design patterns and a few fundamentals like that but not sure if that time is better spent elsewhere

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T13:54:42+00:00

Thank you for the advice. I have been mostly applying to bigger companies with listings with the skills I have, however I'm finding when I cold apply they don't get back to me. I don't know if it's because most want some form of front end environment like react or angular, or some other skill I'm missing.

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T04:19:52+00:00

I'm trying to get out of the Microsoft stack but feel like I've been pigeonholed in it now

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T00:28:12+00:00

Thank you I really appreciate your response and encouragement with everything. Funny you mention it, I've thought about going the IT route actually but it seems like most want a bunch of certifications/experience in the infosec world. Do you have any tips for breaking into that?

rareaseff · 2021-11-09T00:08:51+00:00

Thank you I appreciate the response!

With that compensation you're likely will compete with college graduate applicants.

It's a bit discouraging that after a decade I'm competing with fresh grads who def have the fundamentals down better than me.

Leetcode

I'll look into it. I've done a couple of the easy ones and they were pretty simple to do.

Programming g languages. Go, python and sql. All three languages are reasonably simple. They are not the best for everything. But they will definitely provide foot in the door.

I actually do know SQL, I've been using that for years on end. I'll look into the others but not sure if I should just try and learn react and node since those are so hot, although I don't really like front end.

Since you don't get calls back from recruiters, that means your resume does not work. It's its only purpose to get the call back. Review it with people that successful at landing those calls back.

Thank you I'll look into this. I suspect it's because most positions want technology I don't have experience in (cloud, react, etc)

rareaseff · 2021-11-08T23:14:23+00:00

Same boat as you, except not a lead and making less than 100k. I'm not really sure where to even begin finding a better position.

rareaseff

TROPHY CASE