[koof]

Yes and no. My problem is I thought I loved what I was doing, but there were just little issues with it. Everything has little issues, sure. I never let myself realize until recently that these were problems that were actually harming my quality of life/mental health and that I had lost my love for it. There is a lot of pressure to love the field no matter what, and I think it's unfortunate that reflection isn't encouraged very often around here.

[logn]

My $.02 for you at this point would be: forget the stress of the software industry. If you want to work in another industry, then do so. If you really love programming, you'll probably be drawn to it again. If so, then do it for fun and see where it takes you. You'll probably find though, that most others careers also suck in many ways, and if you like programming, then being a pro programmer isn't that bad of a route.

Overall you have good points though for people early in their careers/education. People should consider their motivations honestly before devoting a lot of time/money/effort to it and it's easy to be blinded by other factors. In the end, most people who make it through a CS degree and entry level jobs to excel in software careers seem to really enjoy programming itself. Others who get into it for money or family pressure usually end up as mediocre or below-average programmers (which is probably fine btw, not everyone needs to be awesome at what they do nor do they necessarily have to like it).