So I was diagnosed with ADHD in my late thirties and before that I was a mess, job to job etc. then got lucky and worked for a company that afforded me the chance to study for my dream job without work pressure.

I am now a software developer and although I went from being the smartest person in the groups I roamed to the dumbest person at work I still have half a foot in my old life of drugs and poor decisions (although the usage has dropped by 95% and I’ve got a good routine and go to bed early).

I feel like a pretentious dick when at a party and someone asks what I do for work, I kinda feel ashamed saying I’m a software developer. Like a fraud I guess.

How to stop this?

  • towerful@programming.dev
    ·
    1 year ago

    I am going through this right now, but without the drugs.
    Mid 30s, waking up to realise my life is a mess, working on getting a diagnosis for ADHD and possibly bipolar, and getting help with depression.
    I am now fixing my life.
    The biggest thing that is helping me is talking about it. Asking for help is important, but just sharing your experiences is also important.
    It was a friend that shared his experiences with me that has put me on this journey of recovery.
    Never any problem solving, or offering solutions or fixes. Just sharing and talking.

    Anyway...

    When I'm doing software dev stuff, I always feel out of my depth. I'm reading interesting articles from people way smarter than I am. I'm reading codebases that are a delight to read through and leave me in awe.
    And I turn to my projects and work, and feel like a fraud. It's all "standing on the shoulders of giants", following tutorials just to get things to compile, locking myself out of VMs or network switches from dumb mistakes.
    But I also work in live events, so still technical and a lot of smart people. But when there is a problem, or a unique problem to solve, I'm just like "yeh, the problem is here because..." or "why not just do this...".
    And these moments make me realise that perhaps I am not a fraud or an idiot. I just have different experience than my peers both in software development and live events. And there is some overlap.

    I think a huge part of it is: everyone is making everything up all the time.
    Some people have made something up before, so they can draw on that experience.
    It's always worth spending a little time introspecting some of your progress.
    Spending less time googling issues, and realising you can figure stuff out (make stuff up) for yourself? Huge win.
    Remembering correct syntax? Huge win.
    Writing code that only has 1 or 2 bugs? Huge win.
    Recognising that a problem is best solved using whatever pattern/library/etc? Huge win.

    Imposter syndrome is real.
    Dunning-kruger is also real.
    And then the imposter syndrome makes you think you are in the dunning-kruger zone, and makes everything worse.
    Recognizing the progress and successes helps