[golergka]

The fact that you feared ORMs probably pushed you to use raw database, and such experience really helps you understand how ORMs work.

Same is true with any abstraction – if you want to learn to use it right, first learn to make do without it.

[kbenson]

Like so many things, it's useful to roll your own, not so you can use it, but so you can understand the complexities and trade-offs inherent in the problem space.

I've written a few ORMs before, and I can do it with fairly succinct and concise codenquickly if needed. I still reach for the full ORM from the beginning, because swapping out layer is painful, and you always want to do it sooner than later.