What next?

Sometimes we reach a cross roads in life, when everything feels uncertain. That’s where I am right now.

Like many people, my identity has always revolved around what I am to other people. Whether it’s the friend that could make you laugh (or cringe), the sweet romantic husband, not afraid to show his affection or the hard working, enthusiastic person I was in my career. Now, everything that defined who I am for so long is up for grabs. OK, I’m still the guy with the bad puns, but everything else is different now.

I have to remind myself that I’ve been here before. When I was 18, I quit college after suffering from a bout of depression. I was ghosted by my girlfriend at the time. I did a dead end temporary job stuffing envelopes and filing paperwork. I had no direction. It was just about getting through the days.

Still, I bumbled along through life, managed to get a permanent job and another girlfriend. A girl that I’d spend the next twenty years with. The job gave me a sense of purpose and rekindled my desire to learn. Hiding underneath the darkness of depression was someone curious about the world around him, enthusiastic about learning and determined to make a better life for myself.

That’s exactly what I did. I liked technology. I was fascinated by how I could press on a little piece of plastic and somehow pixels would appear on a screen. It wasn’t my first love. As a child I wanted to be a writer or a politician, but with terrible handwriting and a shy nature, I couldn’t see a path through.

I started looking through university prospectuses for inspiration. Computer science sounded interesting, it sounded creative, so I got in touch with the University and asked them how a college drop out like me could get in. I did an access course. It was very difficult balancing college, working and being a carer, but at that time in my life I was absolutely determined and full of confidence.

It coincided with the first time I managed to lose a shedload (technical term) of weight, getting down to 12st 8lb. I never do things by halves. I seem to be an all or nothing kind of person. I also learned how to drive. College was easy. I was like a traveller in a desert that had just been given a truck full of water (the sheds were too porous). It was an unquenchable thirst for knowledge.

Uni was much more mixed. I did everything they told you not to. I would concentrate on my strong subjects, investing huge amounts of effort in the subjects that interested me the most, breaking course records as I went and I would just about scrape through the modules that didn’t interest me or involved too much maths. I left things to the last minute but I seemed to have the ability to cram in revision or assignments and I got through. The strong grades papered over the cracks of the weak subjects.

It wasn’t easy. In fact, I nearly gave up. Balancing working, caring for mum, being a boyfriend and uni took its toll on my physical and mental health. Something had to give. I was putting the weight back on fast and had to take an interruption to my studies. Six months later, after a freak accident involving the worlds most unreliable Fiat Cinquecento, I hurt my back. Being a stubborn man, I ignored the pain shooting down my leg until one day it went into full spasm and I spend a couple of nights in the MRI on morphine, unable to walk. I had a slipped disc and sciatica.

After 18 months out of Uni, the future looked bleak once more. I dropped out of college and now it looked like I was going to fail at Uni too, but I didn’t. I kept on going. I spent more time in my second second year trying to sort out an industrial placement than I did on my actual Uni assignments. I knew how important it was going to be to get industrial experience. I went to interview after interview. Always getting selected for the second stage but there was one role that stood out. An agency that was made up of former placement students that had done well.

I took my chance, wrote a covering letter mimicking the companies own website in a move that stood me out from the plethora of other students. I got in, but at some cost. Not only was the placement a pay cut but the agency wanted a software engineer and a designer student and they’d already got their engineer. Design was not my skillset at all, I can barely draw a stick man but they took a punt in me.

At first I struggled. I remember being called into a meeting room one day and fearing the sack. Things weren’t going well. I’d gone from being one of the brightest students at Uni to really struggling. I didn’t get sacked. I carved a niche for myself. My role was part tech support, part dealing with customers and occasionally writing a bit of code. I made myself important to them and by the end of my placement, they wanted to keep me on and were willing to pay my student fees to switch to part time at uni. That’s why it ended up taking me 7 years to finish my degree.

In all honesty, I don’t know how I got through. I was burning the candle at both ends. Sleep was very much optional. I got through, I graduated and graduated with a first and I had a career. I learned from people that were a lot smarter than me and a lot more natural engineers, but with my willingness to learn, I progressed and got quite good.

I watched the company expand. I was there when an entire room full of software developers lost their jobs when funding for a big project was pulled, I survived but the writing was on the wall and after 7 years at that company, I moved on.

That was incredibly scary for me. I don’t really like change. Moving on was a risk, but it paid off. I was earning more money than I ever had. I was enjoying the camaraderie with my new team mates. I felt part of something. I was performing. Life was good. Then the pandemic came and over night everything changed. I didn’t like the isolation of working from home. There was a lot of turmoil going on and where once there was enthusiasm and excitement for learning, now there was fear of not being good enough.

I felt like an imposter, that it was only a matter of time before I was found out. I felt like I was about to lose everything, and actually, I did. I somehow still have a job but it’s no longer a job that brings me joy. I invested so much to get into this career, so now what?

At the age of 41, I don’t know who I am any more. I don’t know what I want to do with my life. I don’t know if my current malaise is something I can work through and come out the other side, back to being the Jon that used to make Christmas cards in Visual Basic and simple games. If not being a dev, then what else can I do?

The chances of making it as a writer are negligible. It won’t pay the sky high mortgage and energy bills.

I don’t even know where to start. I’m not a twenty year old with time on my side anymore. I know that the only person that can make my life better is me, but I don’t know where to start.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I do know where to start. I’ve been neglecting my physical health for too long. I have tried and failed many times to lose weight and keep it off but this time it’s my number one priority. I’ve set myself goals and this time there’s no crazy shakes or unsustainable diet. I’m not looking to change everything over night. Just one small change at a time. Not a temporary change to hit a target but a permanent change to my relationship with food. Hopefully as I lose weight, as I set realistic goals and achieve some of them, it will give me the confidence to sort out the rest of my life.

The fear of failure has had its claws in me for too long. I believe I do have a purpose, even if I haven’t found it yet. There’s got to be a meaning behind all this. I know I’m at my happiest when I’m helping others. I need to find a way to do that.

I don’t want my identity to be Jon the loser (unless you’re talking about weight), Jon the quitter, Jon the failure, or Jon, the depressed guy. I want it to be Jon, the guy that makes people smile, laugh, think or feel something. I can’t do it alone. I’m going to need my friends and family to help me every step of the way, to believe in me and encourage me.

This is my Everest, but I can’t climb it on my own!