I appreciate the commiseration. You’re right that it’s hard to find people who really get it.
The economic challenges of self-employment combined with the cognitive / mental demands of programming conspire to make “programmer” a uniquely difficult thing to carry on as a single parent, despite the income benefits. There are many days I wish I had a more dull job consisting of some sort of mind-numbing piecework, or a low-level management position consisting mostly of meetings and parrying email, the kind of stuff you really can noodle around in 15 minute blocks instead of requiring huge chunks of many unbounded hours to even get into the right headspace for.
As it stands, child-related impositions and constraints feel like an onerous theft of time and focus because programming is so time-intensive and so dependent on precious, scarce focus. That’s really what having that type of responsibility robs me of the most. It’s hard not to get inadvertently resentful and irritable about that.
The causes greatly contribute to the resentment. My child’s mother is a meth addict, and basically abandoned all three of her children to live on the streets and do meth. The other two ended up with her mother. And all of that after being fleeced by the family law industrial complex for $80k in custody litigation (absurd that it took such a sum to make the humanitarian point). I think it would be a lot easier to come to terms with if the cause weren’t so flagrantly, insultingly ignoble.
Oh my god, I'm sorry. I'm sure that introduces more than enough challenges for the children too, not just you. Drug addiction is hell for everyone involved.
You're dead on about the challenges of programming in this sort of situation. It feels like you're constantly falling a little further behind, losing out on opportunities, endlessly switching contexts... It's hard as hell. I often feel as though within 10 years I'll be irrelevant to this industry because I can't possibly be keeping up with my colleagues.
On the bright side, my relationship with my son is a significant motivator, and things do get easier. There's a light at the end I guess.
The economic challenges of self-employment combined with the cognitive / mental demands of programming conspire to make “programmer” a uniquely difficult thing to carry on as a single parent, despite the income benefits. There are many days I wish I had a more dull job consisting of some sort of mind-numbing piecework, or a low-level management position consisting mostly of meetings and parrying email, the kind of stuff you really can noodle around in 15 minute blocks instead of requiring huge chunks of many unbounded hours to even get into the right headspace for.
As it stands, child-related impositions and constraints feel like an onerous theft of time and focus because programming is so time-intensive and so dependent on precious, scarce focus. That’s really what having that type of responsibility robs me of the most. It’s hard not to get inadvertently resentful and irritable about that.
The causes greatly contribute to the resentment. My child’s mother is a meth addict, and basically abandoned all three of her children to live on the streets and do meth. The other two ended up with her mother. And all of that after being fleeced by the family law industrial complex for $80k in custody litigation (absurd that it took such a sum to make the humanitarian point). I think it would be a lot easier to come to terms with if the cause weren’t so flagrantly, insultingly ignoble.