There's a version of this post where I only talk about the projects I'm working on and the skills I'm sharpening. Clean. Professional. Safe. But that's not the whole truth. The truth is I resigned from my job. Not fired. I walked away, because I was financially drowning and mentally exhausted in ways I couldn't keep pretending weren't real. Around the same time, I went through a laminectomy, and the recovery wiped out most of what I had saved. We live in a society where men don't talk about these things. You're supposed to have it together or at least look like you do. So I carried it quietly. For a long time. And then the people I had poured into family I supported intensively, often at the cost of my own well-being pulled away the moment I stopped being useful. No income, no access. Just like that. I should have seen it coming. It had happened before. But I kept believing that if I gave enough, I'd finally earn what I'd always needed from them. I know now that's not how love works. You can't sacrifice your way into belonging. I'm a middle child. Maybe some of this was written into my story from the beginning. But I'm done shrinking to make others comfortable. What kept me going was building. Writing code. Creating things. Putting work out into the world even when the world felt indifferent. It's not glamorous. But it's mine. I'm not writing this for sympathy. I'm writing it because someone out there needs to hear that hard seasons don't disqualify you they clarify you. I'm still here. I'm still building. And I'm open to opportunities.