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Comment by aminozuur | Hacker News Reader

Thank you for sharing your experience. May I ask, how are you doing now? Did you find any ways to address or even overcome those past experiences?

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I am doing well for myself now. How I got here is pretty complicated. I can only attribute my ability to overcome these experiences to those who genuinely cared. These are the people who cared enough to help me succeed but also let me fail and deal with the consequences. In high school, I was a low C to D student. I slept in class. I refused to do homework. I thought the schools were only temporary, so therefore they did not matter. I only passed classes because I excelled at test taking and understood the material. I felt like it was all a game-- people, school, relationships. None of it mattered and all I had to do was find the right way to play. After foster care, I had a free ride (I was still in care), but failed out of college because I didn't see a point. I joined the military. This forced structure and discipline actually helped me. I understood this game and excelled. I used my experience in the military to get an entry level job in IT and continue to grow. There are residual effects that I will always deal with. I have huge gaps in memory from when I was a kid- I don't remember much before age 11. I compartmentalize things too easily. I can be impatient with people. I dislike and distrust bureaucracies. I don't have enough patience for incompetence. I could go on, but I'm sure that's not why you're here :)

Thanks again for sharing. I find your story very relatable, from the gaps in memory (which is common after trauma) to rebelling and failing in the school system.

I wish there was a community just for people in tech who've overcome messy childhoods.

In my book, disliking and distrusting bureaucracy is a hallmark of an intelligent and well-adjusted being.

Hmm, you might want to refine your criteria. I'll grant you Ted Kaczynski was intelligent but well adjusted seems a stretch.

> I can be impatient with people. I dislike and distrust bureaucracies. I don't have enough patience for incompetence.

I hire people with these qualities, most intelligent people I know are like this :)

This is amazing insight actually, thanks for sharing your story. In civilian life, how are you giving yourself structure and holding yourself accountable? I ask because I find creating structure for myself as an adult really helps me do things I wouldn't make time for

Not trying to be snarky, but no one remembers much before age 11 or likes bureaucracies or incompetence.

Kids who went through foster care frequently fail to remember entire years of their life, schools they attended, and families they lived with. There are multiple reasons for this, from trauma causing decreased working memory and formation of longterm memory during childhood to social factors such as lack of the same stability of and reminders of their life that a child who goes to one school for years and then has photos of themselves from that time to cement the memory will have. Most people do remember their life before 11 - the vast majority can name their school and neighborhood from back then without thinking, could tell you if they had a bike, if they liked school, etc. Some of these memories are indeed formed retroactively through stories, but they still exist.

This is a terrible comment. Obviously the GP is speaking in a relative sense, based on their observations and experience with others.

Saying "not trying to be snarky" does little to minimise the snarky attitude.

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