I guess I should start off my introducing myself and a little bit about where I started. My name is Emily and I can't say my life has always been the most stable. At one point my son and I were living in a shelter for about a month, then some extended family reached out and I accepted their offer to move in with them. It was here my life slowly began inching more towards this stability I never had before. I found a reliable job at an apartment complex in the area as a housekeeper, and eventually moved into my own place. It was the first time I felt safe, our apartment was a gated castle and I was so afraid of losing it all. So I spent the next 8 years focusing on raising my son and making sure nothing could breach those castle gates. I was so afraid of taking any risk or chances so even though I was miserable at my job and broke, I resigned myself that it was for the best, we had a roof over our head and we were relatively safe.
Nothing stays the same forever though, and as my son began getting older and more independent I started considering where to go from here. What did I want? After a few failed avenues between looking into a community college and on the job training opportunities, I stumbled upon the r/learnprogramming subreddit community. It was here I saw Leon Noel's post about a bootcamp he was starting and it was totally free to join. Seemed too good to be true but I signed up, joined the discord, and connected with the community while waiting for the first class to start.
Before the first class even started I began making preparations, fully committing to treating this just as if I was going to school or enrolled into a course. One thing I saw mentioned a lot before the class though, was social media. At the time I was a complete social media recluse, even the Facebook I used for my group hobbies was under a totally different alias. But I was told we would need to do check ins via Twitter/X and eventually we would need to create a Linkedin. So I went ahead and joined and began growing my social circle before even realizing just how essential this would be.
The first class was a sort of an awakening for me. He didn't sugarcoat it, this would be hard, really hard but he always emphasized it can be done. I knew my situation would be a bit more difficult, I couldn't give up my full-time job, plus I had my son to care for. I knew I'd need to make changes that would allow my schedule to fully commit to this. So I talked to my son's teachers, my son himself that he'd need to start doing more for himself, and I even went as far as buying paper plates and silverware so I wouldn't have to spend as much time on chores. My entire life became this bootcamp and anywhere I could cut time off for more studying meant a better chance for me to succeed. I won't lie that year was really hard but thankfully those who knew what I was going through understood why I wasn't always available or 100% on top of things. The most important thing I did was finally face my severe anxiety problem I've lived with for so long. I knew if I didn't do something it would hold me back. So I went to my doctor and was prescribed a daily medication to help, I don't know if I would have made it without addressing this early on like I did.
So now I'm in the thick of it, and being consistent and planning my every waking minute was essential. So I started waking up 1 hour earlier than normal which was 5am for me and I would study or work on an assignment until it was time to get my son ready. I'd take my chromebook to work with me (Oh, did I not mention I didn't have a laptop when I started? Ya that was fun.) and any free chance I got from breaks or my lunches I'd get back to coding or studying. I leaned into the 100devs community hard. Anything I didn't understand someone was willing to help, and vise versa. I just want to emphasize that though I was working full-time I consider doing this bootcamp to be full-time as well, even though the classes were just twice a week in the evening, the homework was never light.
To say I struggled in the beginning would be an understatement. I feel like I was dropped into this entirely different world and everyone around me was an alien and I was some lone weirdo human who just couldn't comprehend my new life. But I stuck with it, I remember Leon saying one of the most important things even if you didn't fully understand something was to keep going and eventually a few lessons down the road the previous tidbits of knowledge would click into place. Boy that was rough but they did began piecing together for me. It was around Javascript when I felt like I could start solving problems on my own. I remember some days I would just sit down and do a problem again and again and again for hours until I could get it without looking. Sure it was discouraging seeing others around me solve problems immediately when I was on my fifth attempt, but I never stopped trying. Some would say I was just memorizing but that repetition began drilling the logic and syntax into my brain. Eventually I spread my wings and began really killing it in Codewars. Due to the above repetition I had to do I soon knew Javascript methods like the back of my hand. Finally it was me helping others and I started to feel a bit hopeful.
So here I'll begin mentioning a few resources I attribute a lot of my success to. The first was a course called "Learning How To Learn" by Barbara Oakley. I always struggled in school and this was eye opening and I continued using many of her methods throughout my time in my cohort. Another thing I knew I had to address was my typing. I could mostly type without looking, but it wasn't the proper touch-typing form or without a lot of error. So once a day I'd spend 15 minutes on https://www.typing.com/. This paid of so much faster than I expected. By month 2 of this I no longer needed the 15 minutes a day and I could type so much faster and efficient. I sometimes still go on to go through there programming section they have for those extra hard to reach keys. Another daily resource I had was called Anki. I don't have a great memory so Anki was a life saver as it focuses on spaced repetition. I would do Anki absolutely every day on my lunch breaks and before I went to bed. In the beginning I was so bad at CSS it wasn't even funny, honestly it wasn't until after Javascript that it became a bit easier for me to understand it and not get so frustrated. I went through Flexbox Froggy a few times before feeling comfortable with it. They have other great CSS games you can check out too.
Now onto networking, for I'd have no journey to speak of without it. Networking I'd say is just as important if not more to getting a job as a developer. Being highly skilled is valuable, but without strong interpersonal skills, you might end up as a brilliant developer working alone in a dimly lit basement. It's crucial to be both competent and personable if you want to succeed. One of the requirements of 100devs was having 3 coffee chats a week which means talking to someone currently working in the industry. It took me DAYS to work up the nerve to message someone I was following on Twitter/X. I had liked and commented on some of their previous posts so in my message I would try to bring something relevant up and then ask if they'd be open to chatting about their experiences as developer. I honestly can't remember anyone reacting negatively to this, at the worst we'd have scheduling conflicts so a meeting could never occur. I'd say most people are really open and even flattered someone wants to learn from them. If you feel apprehensive it's great to go into these meetings with a list of questions you can fallback to. Not every coffee chat you leave will be revolutionary or eye opening but you'll find the ones you connect with eventually. Another source I used for these chats was a website called LunchClub. Also I began getting involved in my local community and volunteering with Women In Tech groups as well as attending meetups often.
So, if your still here with me reading this I'll try to fast forward a bit. Towards the end of my cohort we had a big project we were to do called a "100 Hour Projects" meaning, well exactly that. It should be a project you at least put 100 hours into, something you could talk about in an interview that is truly unique and personal to you. For me it was a fullstack application I created called Parrot, but I'll go into those details another time. What is important is that at this point in the cohort I felt learning React was important, so I was determined to spend the extra time learning and doing this project with React. I used a lot of youtube tutorials for first dipping my toes (I'll list these sources I used below) but after that I thought the best way to learn was just coding myself. So my application Parrot took a bit longer, but it gave me a more solid understanding and another skill I could use to leverage myself into a job. While focusing on learning React I will say I did drop a lot of my daily typing, Anki, and networking habits I was doing previously. I don't regret it as at this point I was tired, and it was nice to just code and gain some more confidence in my technical skills. When I was done it was time to update my resume and portfolio and begin focusing on honing my skills and looking into others. I hadn't decided to go all in on a job search yet, but I had my resume and portfolio updated.
About a month after I posted about Parrot that a friend and connection from my cohort reached out about a new job she just started. It was a contract but it was with an e-learning company and they were looking for new developers to join. She asked if I'd be interested and of course I would be, e-learning was right up my alley. So I connected with the founders and my interview was a tech interview by 2 people who did not know tech. To say I was asked any hard technical questions or coding challenges would be quite the lie. They knew about me through my friend and were extremely excited about my project Parrot as it very much aligned with their beliefs and mission as a startup. So after 1 hour of chatting about my skills and project, I was presented with my very first developer contract. I learned, had to learn, a lot on the job. This is where I learned more about UI accessible components, Typescript, some design, and Next.js. I started out part-time keeping my full-time job but I finally made the decision to fully commit to transitioning to my new life as a developer. I had been working this contract on a more full-time basis and at times picking up other contracts here and there just from word of mouth. At one point a company googled Node, "City I live in" and my name was first to pop up. So I'd test out googling your name and skills and see how your SEO is too.
My most recent job came about because I learned early on to mention I'm now a web developer at any given opportunity, as you never know where you next connection could be. One day my landlord was over doing some work outside when we were chatting and I had brought up my new job. Well, it just so happened he had a family member that just started their own tech company and were looking for some frontend work. I said I'd be willing to chat with them and about a week later I received a phone call. We began working together on a contract basis for a few months, when they decided to open a staff role for a FE developer. I was encouraged to apply and given I was already working with them the interviews I had went really well. I accepted an offer for my first now salaried role as their Frontend Developer. I believe my first contract with a startup really helped set me up for success in this type of environment. Being adaptable to sudden changes, collaboration, and resilience all helped me by the time I moved onto other production codebases.
So was some of this luck? Being at the right place at the right time, I'd say a bit. I will say without all the hard work I put and willingness to constantly be learning I wouldn't be this far. The new codebase I'll be working in I had to learn Storybook, Jest, Material UI, and other libraries I was unfamiliar with. Given how quickly I was able to learn these skills definitely helped, it wasn't just my oh so charming personality that got me the offer. I know the tech market is really rough right now, but I believe this just means you come from a different angle to hook something. Be willing to compromise a bit (maybe you don't get your dream company at first), be willing to put yourself out there more, learn publicly as you do this. If you have any questions please feel free to reach out, I hope this can inspire more women and self taught developers that you can do it even if it seems hard and impossible. Imposter syndrome still eats at me every day but I don't let it make the decisions anymore.
Honorable Resource Mentions:
Full React Tutorial (youtube link - Net Ninja)
React Crash Course (youtube link - Traversy Media 2024 update)
Kevin Powell for all things CSS (no specific link)