| I'm grateful that a thread like this pops up every so often. It's really difficult out there! I just turned 40 and have been feeling down about that unfortunate fact and the job search process has really piled on on the bad feelings. I'm not happy to see others in similar situations, but it really helps to hear that I'm not alone. I briefly had a position this year before running into the wall that is a reduction-in-force. I was hired (along with 2 other engineers) in December and told that the company was looking to grow (great!) only to start on-boarding on a Tuesday in January and receive word that very Friday that there was serious money problems that they had only just realized. I somehow made it through the first layoff 10 weeks later only to get swept up in the next one in August. I had been hoping it would hold out until 2025, alas... In the last 2 years, I've spent more time hunting for jobs than holding one. This time around I've stuck to searching in my network and have been having surreal experiences where I'm being referred by VPs and C-suite folks and still getting ghosted or very slow walked through the process (a month goes by and I'm still waiting on next steps). Would love to bust out of this rut, but cant' seem to get my brain to come up with a pivot. I zigged into software development in 2013 (was a middle school teacher prior to that), and I really thought it would last longer than a decade. Not sure where I can zag that will allow me to retire in 20 years. Luckily, I have savings and a lead on a few hours of freelancing, but health insurance is such an incredible expense for our family (it's more than the mortgage, it's more than child care) that it can't last forever. In talking with other "knowledge workers" I'm seeing that the struggles engineers have been feeling for 2+ years is leaking into their world. My wife works in an adjacent field and is struggling to find clients/jobs. My friends who were laid off by news media companies aren't finding work producing content. Everything feels like it's in a standstill. |
System working as intended lmao
zig zag!