Doing this to me for the Autism Acceptance Month should be considered a hate crime.
I’m going to cut straight to the point for those of you that don’t want to read this whole mess of a post:
I discovered on Thursday that I’m being laid off from my job at the end of April.
I don’t know if I’ve been very lucky or flat-out fortunate or just very good at planning to get to where I am in my career, but I have very mixed emotions about getting this news. Especially after over seven years of stellar reviews and praise from the colleagues I respected and I believe respected me. There are, naturally, details I don’t want to discuss publicly regarding the inner workings and bureaucracy of the company as a whole, but I’ll keep it simple: the place is a mess.
Which is why I was more shocked that it happened now, rather than maybe in a couple more months, during the usual “slow season”. When I would’ve been in a much better position than where I am now. Sitting at my desk. Debating on what else can be packed and moved over in my sedan that I can haul over to my sister’s new place that she and her partner are DIYing into shape.
The irony of having to rush to move out of a place I secured for a shorter commute to a job that I ended up fighting to work remotely isn’t lost on me.
I was also given the option another developer was given when he was laid off last year to freelance alongside the department when things pick up again, which is something I have the weekend to chew on. Even if it does leave a bitter taste in my mouth.
My original goal had been to leave on my own terms and offer them a similar deal so I could have the flexibility to travel abroad and continue my language-learning to have the option to fulfill a life-long dream. One that I began to have even more doubts about (read: severe depressive episode) ever since coming back from my much-needed vacation after working several weekends to meet work deadlines.
Now, however, I’m sort of in the midst of a scramble to cut costs, navigate impending unemployment at the end of April, debate whether or not I can afford health care on my own, sell my home (which would eliminate the remainder of my student loans if there’s anyone who can actually afford it in this dreadful economy), and figure out if what I thought I wanted to do is worth pursuing. Oh, and, well, trying to find a new job, writing and revising a couple of books, and all of that fun sort of stuff…
So, yeah.
I honestly have so much more I could say, but I probably shouldn’t. Aside from having a moment of reflection in an ice cream shop down the street from my sister’s house where I felt transported back to being a teenager doing job shadowing and freelance. Back when I drove my beat up ’99 Honda Civic around in the dark and memorized the lyrics to a song by a band I never heard of and scoured the internet for years to find. The very song playing on the speakers while I crunched on chocolate chips and mulled over how the hell I was going to manage everything and what I was going to do now.
Needless to say, but my writing schedule is getting thrown out the window for a while. My Patreon will continue to be paused like it has been since the end of last year. I’m shutting down my Ghost site/old newsletter platform in favor of Kit and hopefully using my own website more for posts like this (because the former is free and the latter I need to pay for anyway, so yeah…). Whatever scheduled posting I can manage, I’ll try.
I’m sorry if I don’t reply to anyone on socials in a timely fashion over the next few weeks since I’m going to be buried in moving boxes (and checking social media gives me extreme psychic damage tbh). I really do appreciate all the support and kindness I’ve caught in passing while hopping on meeting after meeting and discussing timelines for literally everything happening right now.
Please bear with me while I pick up the pieces and try to move forward in whatever direction I end up going next.