Dealing with life’s adversities while trying to change
Being ill is not foreign to me. I have been sick all of my life.
I’ve even been in a few life-threatening situations, spanning from cancer, heart disease, to even a transplant. A few years ago I made some lifestyle changes, which brought huge improvements not only to my physical health but also my mental health.
For those that went through the Udacity FEND program with me, you may remember I was really big into racing. I was even able to complete my first half marathon while doing the program. After that, I had set a goal, and training regiment to do a full marathon to celebrate my 40 year transplant anniversary, this February. Unfortunately, my body had different plans.
Once I finally graduated from the FEND program, and training for my second half marathon I pulled my IT band, I was like no problem.
Rest, do my PT, and get in the race, next race opportunity wasn’t until April.
I am not sure if the stress from finishing Udacity, my injuries, or the pressure that I put on my self to train for the marathon is what did me in.
But my immune system decided to go into overdrive, so that put me on immune-suppressing medication, which totally knocked me out.
After several different meds, we finally found something that has got me somewhat functioning, but to this day I have not been able to run due to severe muscle fatigue.
At the same time, my husband got a hernia, unlike me, he has never had any serious illness or surgery. So now you have two very active people with some serious fitness goals, totally sidelined.
I had to figure out what I was going to do with the skills I had learned with Udacity. I had made the decision during a Udacity Career Event that I wanted to go into Developer Advocacy.
So I changed my mindset and focused on what I need to do to become a developer advocate and take some of the stress and pressure off of myself.
Then Udacity announced that they would be offering a scholarship in cloud development, and I knew that this was a skill set that I was going to need for the career path that I wanted to take.
The opportunity was not going to be available until November, so my study buddy from the FEND program and I, spent the whole summer doing a Google Cloud certification challenge, so that way if we got into the Udacity program we would know something about cloud technology.
After 3 months of studying, labs, and quizzes, we took the exam, and both of us failed.
Having bipolar1 disorder, this almost sent me into a committable cycle.
There is only so much a human mind and body can take.
Here is a link to my article about that journey Failure — What exactly is it?
This was also taking a toll on my marriage.
My husband literally told me to pull my head out of my a**, get my s*** together, and figure out what I was going to do.
Either I was going to code and change my career or figure out how to make my current situation work, but what we were doing was not working. I knew that I could not wait until November to find out if I got into the Udacity DevOps challenge, or handle not getting in either.
So I decided to go to a local Boot Camp in my community, to get myself back on track and get some of the soft skills that I missed with the Udacity FEND program.
While going through the application process for the BootCamp, I was having issues with seeing and focusing. So I decided to go get my eyes checked and get new glasses for school.
Here came another blow, my glaucoma had gotten worse, and I had lost more of my vision. At the rate I was going I would be blind in this eye within 5 years.
The doctor advised surgery immediately to slow down the progression of my blindness.
The only issue was I was already two weeks into my Bootcamp, and I had been accepted into the Udacity DevOps challenge.
I had not even decided if I was actually going to do the Udacity challenge or not, since I also have a full-time job.
My study buddy from the FEND program had also gotten accepted.
I told her that I was thinking about not doing the DevOps challenge, I felt I had too much on my plate.
I did not tell her about my recent diagnosis or that I was contemplating checking myself into an outpatient facility.
Being the awesome friend that she is, she talked me into giving it a go.
I scheduled my surgery for the next year but changed it to the week before Christmas so that I could get it over with and move on.
This time around I did not wait to reach out for help. I told the Udacity group that I was ready to throw in the towel, why do all this training, when in 5 years I wouldn’t be able to see what I’m doing anyway. I was at a point I was not only wanting to throw in the towel with my studies but life itself.
Not that I went that far in telling the group.
The support, encouragement, suggestions, and resources that I got was tremendous. It also gave me hope, even at my BootCamp, the manager introduced me to an instructor who only has the use of one eye.
They also sat down with me and discussed my situation, and in the new year, we will come up with a plan to not only help me catch up with things that I missed but get me back on track to graduate.
My study buddy checks in on me almost on a daily basis, even sent me a get well teddy bear and a zen book.
I am slowly getting more involved with the community since my surgery.
This past weekend, I set some manageable, attainable goals and even put them on a whiteboard so that they are visible every day.
Not hidden in a closed notebook, or an unopened app.
I am also making a conscious effort not to hide either. Realizing that I with my friends I am neither a bother or a burden.
For those that are going through something similar, always remember that our friends and family can not fix what they don’t know is broken.
For us not wanting to bother or burden is not the solution to our situation.