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Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

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Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#91

Post by DamnInteresting »

My professional resume looks a lot like yours. If you find yourself in the SLC area anytime soon, I have a 2012 15" MacBook Pro I can give you. It's older, but it's solid, it works great. The only exception is the battery, it doesn't hold a charge for very long any more, so it needs to be plugged in for prolonged work sessions. A new battery is only about $90 if you're inclined to replace it.[1]

Best of luck moving forward.

[1] https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Retina+Disp...

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#92

Post by hluska »

soared wrote: post #11

Ignore 95% of comments here. Research your options for local support through the government and religion. Religion may be more helpful in your area, even if your beliefs don’t exactly align. There is housing, food, etc available to you but you’ll likely need a social worker for help find it. https://switchpointcrc.org/ is local to you with food, shelter, etc. More info from a gov source: https://sgcityutah.gov/busine…

I’ll hijack this a little with a question. Why do you think you’re qualified to tell OP to ignore 95% of the comments? That’s a lot of ego to bring to something so important…especially when you give the most superficial advice.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#94

Post by nicoburns »

kevinmershon wrote: post #21
gremlinsinc wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've got 10 years experience with laravel, lots of PHP, JavaScript, vue, react, MySQL, Python etc...i just don't have a computer unless I can find a place to set up my desktop... that's my biggest hurdle.

While all those skills are great to have, you're now competing with every unemployed junior, fresh grad, and old coder on the market. You need to update your skill set, and ideally focus on skills that are in higher demand and with higher barrier to entry or with a captive audience/market. Vue/React/Python are all still huge but they're commodity skills today. Differentiating will help with the jobseeking.

None of those skills are really out of date. Laravel is also still huge. And almost everyone is still using SQL.

And just because these are areas in which there are many juniors devs have doesn't mean that senior devs are competing directly with them.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#95

Post by treebeard901 »

You have to find any kind of income and work and go every single day while finding a place to live, even if it is out of your car. Make sure you have everything you need to get employment and make every minute about finding a job, a better job, or being at work earning money that you save up. This is all much more difficult than it sounds because the costs to just show up to work can add up quickly. Luckily, it sounds like you do not have anyone actively working against you to take away this basic human right to support yourself.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#96

Post by nicoburns »

gremlinsinc wrote: post #15
notsure357 wrote: post #6

Your dreams of making it in AI sound far fetched to me. I would look for a more solid career path such as within a trade. Learn basic plumbing or electrical work. You might be able to find someplace to work as an apprentice as you learn too.

I was making 50 per hour doing freelance programming two years ago but I've had trouble finding clients and then I didn't have a place to work from, making it even harder. That's my biggest obstacle. I've got 10+years experience with PHP, JavaScript, laravel. etc...

You could consider looking for a job at a software development "agency" that specialises in those technologies. There should still be plenty of such jobs for an experienced developer (especially if you're willing to accept a lower-then-"big tech"-but-still-good salary).

They'll not only provide you with a regular income (no need to find your own clients), but will likely provide you with a work computer and an office space too.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#97

Post by kerkeslager »

dvsfish wrote: post #73
reactordev wrote: post #69

I’ve been there. I lost my marriage, my house, my money, my parents, my job, everything. Literally $100k in the hole with $0 in the bank. Sounds like you know how to survive, which is perfect… here’s what you do. Ditch uber/lyft and get your CDL. They’ll pay you and train you and give you a job. Plus, you get a nice sleeper truck to sleep in that’s more spacious than your car. (If you have the cash, an RV works inste…

I feel like this would be great advice if "CDL" was unambiguously googleable. This might be regional but I have no idea what this is meant to mean.

Second result for me is "commercial driver's license" on both Kagi and Google.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#98

Post by arnonejoe »

I used to live near the YMCA in Encinitas. There would be people along the road that lived in a camper and I assume would shower at the Y. Maybe to that to save on rent. Maybe go on GoFundMe and plead your case. Good luck man. You will make it through.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#99

Post by LouisSayers »

> What would YOU do in my situation to break the cycle?

  1. Get a laptop (Buy or Borrow)
  2. Get a gym membership (i.e. shower, keep up fitness)
  3. Apply for local dev jobs (work out of the library)
The main thing for me would be to maintain cleanliness and to find work in an office. An office job solves many issues in your case (don't need to find clients, they usually supply computer gear, a place to eat breakfast, lunch etc).

If you have a plan but can't afford e.g. a gym membership or laptop, then use gofundme or equivalent to get help from others to execute on your plan.

I mean, you could even just visit local tech meetups and tell them what you need, I'm sure there'll be some people that can help you out.

Re: Ask HN: How do I escape homelessness after rebuilding my mental health?

#100

Post by turtlebits »

If you have the skills, find an entry level desk job with lots of free time - SOC/NOC technician, IT, help desk. (maybe a swing/graveyard shift) and use the time to educate yourself/learn or do freelance work.

Lots of tech short term contractor work out there, you'll have a leg up if you can work in office (which may give you access to a shower)

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