Possible Career Change - 2nd Opinion - Thanks

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I recently moved to Portland to accept a new job, still in software. I'm a ColdFusion programmer by trade. The job I have right now is good -- I'm finally being paid the bare minimum for someone with my skill-set after many years of not even making what Salary.com says is the minimum for my experience. The problem isn't with the job I have now, it's with the awareness that job-loss is one of the diagnostic criteria for AS. So the fact that I lost a lot of jobs in the past is really just indicative of my state, and no matter how much I like my current job, I can't rely on it as my only source of income.

In addition to being aware that I can't rely on the job I have as my only source of income, I also have a big problem with child support. Unfortunately the state has never had a realistic expectation of my earning potential, so as a result I've accrued $10k in child-support debt each year for the past 7 years (so I'm now $70k in debt). The state (TX and FL so far) refuses to acknowledge job loss as a reason for modifying the child support, so the fact that I've been fired from all the $40-70k jobs I've had and that none of them have lasted more than 18 months leaves me where I am now. My actual income for the last 7 years has been in the neighborhood of $25k/yr in spite of higher salaries.

So my hope is that if I can get an official Dx for Asperger's, that can be used to prove to the state that their expectation of my income potential is unrealistic and to amend that expectation. Further I had hoped there might be some chance of getting grants or even just plain "help" for businesses owned by a person with a disability.

I contacted someone recently who's an advocate for the autism community, who works with non-profits and does referrals. I explained my situation to him and my hopes. His answer, in a nutshell:

a) You can't convince the state to have a realistic expectation of your earning potential

b) Software is a dead-end, give up now and change careers or die in debt

He gave lots of reasons for answer B (fewer for answer a), however, they amount to hearsay - very vague notions about the direction of the industry that I've heard from nearly everyone else (not to mention having heard essentially the same thing from more than one person about any/every other type of job I've ever considered, most of them totally unrelated to programming). There aren't any facts or figures to back up these generalizations, just the vague general agreement of an amorphous group of semi-random strangers who agree that the industry is headed this direction or that and will continue indefinitely.

Hence my desire for a 2nd opinion (or 5). I don't even mind continuing to be poor as long as I can convince the state that it's a reasonable expectation of me. But I see people - several folks that I know personally - who seem to be making good money selling their own small software (enough to own their own homes). So from my POV it should only take finding the right NT with some marketing skills to help me create a niche.

Any referrals or general input greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

ike

I think it's probably true that you're unlikely to convince the state to lower it's expectations.

I don't think software is a deadend career path, just a short path for the young. I think you have to continously upgrade your skills. It seems to be dominated by young people who employers can work to death. Self-employment is nice work if you can get it.

I and other aspies survive through civil service, working for the federal, state or local government. They have to accomodate, and they need IT specialists. An official diagnosis is not required. I provided my employer with a letter from my doctor obliging them to put me on a regular schedule. (The letter made no reference to any specific condition. My primary provider seems to be as convinced as I am that I have this condition. A disgnosis would only complicate my insurance.)

The pay for civil service is reasonable and the benefits are excellent.

Gee, you must have a really bad child support system in the USA. Ours in Australia is far from perfect, but at least you can have your assessment reduced if your income significantly drops or other circumstances occur. The system now is too far stacked in favour of the custodial parent whereas before it was stacked against them.

That's per child. I have 3... And a circumcision.

Last edited by ike on 11 Dec 2007, 9:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I could be wrong, but I don't think finding a govt job would be very easy with my skill set... I know that there are some direct-hire govt jobs for people who program in ColdFusion, but my experience has been that they're much more frequently contract jobs that don't include the "difficult to fire" clauses. I was fired from 2 of those contracts last year alone. I've also worked for a couple of companies that did outsource programming work for various govt agencies like the Broward County Property Appraiser's office in Ft Lauderdale. I'm told that the guys who actually worked in the BCPA office could sit around and eat crackers all day with their feet up on their desk, but that of course didn't apply to the folks programming their web-apps, which were all outsourced. This even in spite of the fact that I know ColdFusion is unusually popular amongst government offices and a friend of mine even is earning high-6-figures managing development for the US Congress, doing basically what I do. Again, I'd love to be proved wrong.

Software is still a good field to get into. The rumors that older IT workers aren't appreciated, everything is going to India, etc. are exaggerations. Dice.com is ample proof of that.

Try to find out why you've been getting fired and take steps to keep it from happening. Contract programmers are fired more easily than permanent employees, so there's a sharper thumbnail on your neck.

Well most of my jobs have been "permanent" jobs actually... and in most of the cases I understand why what I said got me fired very shortly after having been fired, but it doesn't seem to help because I don't seem to be able to associate the past event with any future circumstances. Which might leave me down to just trying to avoid talking to coworkers period as much as possible, which isn't something I'm inclined to do. I actually really like people on the general whole and tend to be very talkative, perhaps too much so. But don't seem to be able to understand how to express my opinions without having others make bad assumptions and draw nonsense conclusions about me.

For example, although I don't recall the specific details of the conversation, I do recall that at one job my boss started a conversation about hookers and I entered into it a moment later. I don't recall the specific context he started on, but a day or 2 later I was fired. He claimed that his boss had left for a vacation and told him as he was headed out the door to fire me for unspecified reasons. While it's possible that may have been true, in retrospect the whole scenario seems very fishy and it seems like he and the lead programmer were behaving oddly while they were firing me, in spite of the fact that it's the only job that's ever given me "severance".

My stance on anything of a sexual nature is basically that, while I may have unconventional ideas about it I'm certainly, absolutely NOT interested in approaching (romantically or sexually) anyone who either a) I'm working with or b) is uninterested in me. Nor am I interested in talking about sex with anyone who's uncomfortable discussing the subject with me. There wasn't an opportunity to explain that in particular and I'm not sure if it would have mattered if I had because I think most people are pretty solidified in their assumptions before the opportunity to express something like that presents itself.

I had mentioned the above event in an "extreme honesty" forum on Tribe.net several months ago while searching for others who may have had similar experiences (didn't know about Asperger's then), and was told that I was lying.

In a separate forum (also on Tribe) I had mentioned having difficulty understanding why people "flip out" about things like once I put a note on the front of a car that was so loaded up with bumper stickers that it would have been a challenge to walk by it and not notice it and had just said in the note "hi, I work here, like your bumper stickers, give me a call if you'd like to get coffee some time". Apparently I scared the crap out of the girl who drove the car, who told her boss, who called my boss to tell her to "rein in" her employee. I wasn't aware that complementing someone was so offensive.

One person in particular on Tribe had said that putting a note on her car was tantamount to saying "I know where you live", which I discounted as being "paranoia", because if you die your hair hot pink and a stranger in a club complements you on it and offers to buy you a drink, you don't immediately assume "heheh I've been heh following you around heh heh... snicker..." in the complement. I unfortunately didn't explain that POV so clearly in the original forum. But then the person who made the comment decided it was a good idea to talk to other people in front of me while deliberately ignoring me after I made her aware that she'd later offended me by saying that I "lack boundaries".

And on an only very vaguely related note... Why is it wrong for me to tell people that I'm "bisexual"? People who are gay (men or women) are perfectly fine telling everyone they meet at first sight that they're gay. You can bring a new coworker to his cube and say "Hey, Bob, this is our new Accounts Receivable guy Mike", and Bob can say "Hi mike, I'm the Technical Support Manager and I'm GAY!" and it's not a problem. If anything it's potentially un-PC to even mention how out-of-context the comment is... yet even when other people bring up the subject of sex in the most clinical of contexts and it's totally relevant to the conversation, I'm liable to get hairy eyeballs for saying I'm bisexual. At least that's my perception.

Anyway, thank you for the reply ... I think I neglected to say thank you to the other couple of folks who replied and I wanted to make sure I'm letting people know that I appreciate the input / feedback, particularly because I know that I'm talking about a number of "sore subjects" and so I'm not sure how steeped my responses are in lingering negative associations from past events and resulting in my coming across as just being bitter, angry or just trapped in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It sounds like part of the problem may be too much information, too soon. Subjects like sex, religion, politics or ethnic anything can be bombs that blow up in anyone's face. Stay away from these subjects for now. Companies are hyper-sensitive to lawsuits from employees who say "so-and-so is creating an offensive workplace environment for me". The best course for now may be to let someone else bring up a subject so you'll know what they're comfortable with. If it's a subject listed above tell them you're not comfortable talking about it. Ask the advocate you mentioned earlier if he has any ideas of subjects to avoid.

I'm not advocating fear, just a more cautious approach. Once people get to know you a bit, you can open up as the situation warrants.

Thanks MF.

Yes. I agree. And if someone gets into a conversation with you about topics like that, perhaps you should just say, "That's interesting" and nothing more. People bring up things that are not PC at work, but it becomes a problem if your beliefs are different than theirs. "That's interesting" solves a lot of problems. They were heard, you didn't disagree, and you don't have to state what you believe. You can also follow that with "I prefer not to talk about controversial topics at work" if pressed into saying more than "That's interesting."

Nice sig, Kat.

You had better get a lawyer who specializes in that subject about convincing the states.

You may be able to fight some employers based on the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Yeah, that's been my hope.



Well not yet, but maybe once I have a Dx.

Thanks Panda.

If you check out the Americans with Disabilities Act:

http://www.eeoc.gov/facts/fs-ada.html

In principle, you do not even need a diagnosis: you only need to be regarded as having an impairment.

Thanks Panda... I guess I'd still have to know what constitutes being "regarded as having an impairment" ... it may or may not apply in our case. It may be something like "well it was obvious he was hard of hearing even though he didn't wear a hearing aid" vs. someone in our condition and the comment being "it was obvious he was a really smart guy and perfectly capable, but was just an irresponsible jaggoff".

I've never known anyone who after having known me for a while would have described me as having a disability. Basically I've only known people who might give the 2nd description with some variation of the "irresponsible jaggoff" part...

[insert favorite explanation for "it's his own fault" here] ...

that's what I'm unsure of ... I'm inclined to think that unless it's something that's obvious to the average person working for my company, the court wouldn't rule that I was "regarded as having impairment".

Mind my asking ..... about the last part of the comment