Changing one’s life is a difficult business. Never mind the confidence issues that come with learning a new career. Never mind the mental stress whispering that something could go wrong–all this time and money spent on transition could be wasted. Never mind the drain from the soul-search that brought you to the conclusion that change was needed in the first place. Never mind all that.
The most difficult part of this business is when you realize it’s impossible to do it alone.
Most everyone reading this has a support system of one degree or another. Things are hard, yes, but there are people you can depend on. The worst things in life that you dread are many, many catastrophes away, though in the dead of night they may seem to be breathing menacingly just under your bed.
Right now, my wife and I are paying for me to attend a coding boot camp. It is both expensive and massively time-consuming. I hope to come out on the other side of this with opportunities to command a much higher salary than I did in the past and the chance to do something that I find thrilling every day. But this move would be impossible without layers upon layers of support.
First, there are my friends, some of whom have experience in the programming world who tipped me off to coding and that I might like it. I probably wouldn’t be studying C# were it not for their assurances that I could pull this off.
Then there is my family–both my parents and my in-laws. I try to appreciate the security net that they provide, both to make sure I’m thankful and also to let the stresses about money live in a more realistic place. I’m lucky, it’s true. If something bad were to happen to my wife and I financially, we wouldn’t be on the streets. So I’m thankful for that, and also that they are forever saying positive things and helping out with childcare (I don’t even think they think of it as helping out).
And speaking of childcare…
The heavy-lifting that my wife has done on the home front since my time at Tech Elevator began is heroic. We have an eight-year-old daughter, a second-grader, a tall-for-her-age, blond-haired, kaleidoscope- eyed girl who loves reading, cooking, and pretending she’s a spy (and watching Netflix and eating candy as well). She’s good. She’s kind, thoughtful and strangely honest.
But even a child who is well-behaved requires a lot of attention, a lot care, and a lot of focus when life is trying to pull your focus to the four winds. My wife has a full-time, difficult job. She just began at a new company in October and is still trying to prove herself and find her place at work. On top of this, the childcare that we once split 50-50 has taken a dramatic 90-10 tilt in her direction.
But life at home goes on. We still sit down for dinner, my daughter still attends her girl scouts meetings, her Odyssey of the Mind practice (which my wife coaches), and the myriad other events that populate a second-grader’s life. With all of these extra stresses, life goes on and life goes on in a good way.
There are many benefits to challenging yourself. Hard work usually pays off in one way or another. But one benefit of pushing yourself is often over-looked: only in the trenches do you realize the size of the army behind you.
From Retail to Programming 