DEV Community

Cover image for My Programming Journey
Kulsum Shaikh
Kulsum Shaikh

Posted on

My Programming Journey

"I don't want to be a Programmer like everyone else in the family!" These are the words that I had repeated countless times as I had grown up. I had always wanted to be different. I had dreamed of being many different things like a cop, a fashion designer, and a nurse.

When I got into 9th grade, I had a class called "intro to Programming". It was a required class so I had to take it. The first few days, I was so lost and felt like I wanted nothing to do with it. As time went on, I started understanding more things. I felt interest in the way it worked. After class, I would ask my dad questions about different concepts in programming. I had even started doing a Python course online. All of this was great, but I still did not want to pursue anything in tech so I gave up on the course overtime.

After I graduated, I picked my major as Nursing. As I was going through Nursing, I struggled many times. I felt like giving up and went back to it a couple of times. Even though it was great, it didn't feel right for me. I did not want to leave as I had already done a year and a half. I felt like it would be a "waste of time". Then, my family made a sudden decision of moving to Texas from New Jersey.

When I first moved here, I took a semester off to get settled in. Then, when I started applying to colleges, I realized that most of them are not willing to accept many of the credits that I had worked so hard to achieve. I did not want to start over so I decided to give up on it altogether. While this was going on, my dad had encouraged me to start doing some lessons online as well.

I started doing a html course and a python course online. I started enjoying it a lot and was doing it regularly. Then, after a few months, my brother told me to apply to Flatiron School. He had went to it and had loved it a lot. I applied to it, not expecting much and started doing LeetCode problems. After a little while, I got accepted! Now, here I am, doing what I love with people that I love!

With this story, I just want to remind people that no matter how many setbacks there are, you should keep going! You never know which setback is going to change your life forever!

Top comments (2)

Collapse
 
loganamollo profile image
Wayne Logan

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how to tell a story. No villain backstory or overnight success to motivate people, but a slow burn that shows that it can be done and how exactly to do it.
Thanks for the quality content, keep up

Collapse
 
shaikhk2 profile image
Kulsum Shaikh

Thank you so much Wayne!