!dev

Childhood trauma has lasting effects and it's our own responsibility to identify them and break our barriers.

I have 2 projects, both of them are stuck because 1. Dependant on other team and I am not able to fix the setup of their service even after seeking help from them; 2. My setup of Android Studio started throwing error out of no where when I am low on time for merging the code to mainline, we need to perform QA and without my build working we might not be able to test a use case.

I have scrum tomorrow, I feel scared to tell this to my stakeholders just because I think they will think it's my problem. Something wring with me. As a child my father blamed me for the mistakes I didn't have any control over, again and again. Whenever I feel awkward in any situation I think that he must have said that how big of a dumb I am. How I don't have any brains to do anything. Those things still come to me. That's why I am scared, people will BLAME me for this. But I have worked on my capacity to solve this. That's it.
That's all that matters. I have seeked help already, now I need to discuss this with the management and not feel scared.

Yeah Android Studio build breaks just about every time shit gets updated, avoid updating when you can't afford to lose hours fucking trying to get shit working again

It’s amazing just how much effect it has, and how long it lasts. I’m still trying to work through mine.

Because of childhood abuse (physical, emotional, mental, more physical) every time someone is angry, or I think I said/did something will make them angry, I’m terrified they will turn violent and just start beating me senseless, and/or hold a grudge forever. Because of this, I avoid confrontation far more than is healthy. Similar for anything that isn’t accepted and totally normal: I am terrified I will be publicly ridiculed, have my things ruined or stolen, or be beaten until I’m a sobbing, bleeding heap with no assistance from anyone. I also feel like I’m instinctively to blame for other people’s blunders if it’s related to my work in any way, and sometimes even if it isn’t. All of this leads to crippling social anxiety and self-consciousness. This, plus the complete lack of privacy I had while growing up also explains my near-paranoia level of privacy consciousness.

I’m not seeking sympathy. I’m just trying to say that I know how you feel and what you’re saying.

I’ve also sought out professional help, and I’ve been working through it as best I am able. But it takes time, and there’s so much to work through. Some day I hope to simply feel comfortable in my own skin and around others. Such a simple sounding goal.

But for now, I never feel good enough, and like everyone would very much rather I just went away.

Related: I’ve done my best to step out of my comfort zone here on devRant.

For what it’s worth if you are a developer you probably aren’t dumb. Development is something that a very small part of the population can even wrap their minds around. People drop out of engineering programs because they can’t get past the basics.

And for getting blame? You are going to be soft-blamed as a developer occasionally. The accusers see code as magic so at best you are soft blamed; how much can they blame a code sorceress when they have no magic themselves?

Even if you are only speaking the truth you need your a poker face. If you make yourself seem vulnerable they will assume you deserve blame because you are acting vulnerable. If you confidently say it is out of your hands they will believe that because you said it confidently. They have no way to understand the actual magic so they will use your poker face to determine if you are bluffing.

Face it head-on and use solid arguments in your favor: people like confronting each other when they see an opportunity to turn arrows on the scapegoat.

A 10000% agreed with the above advice.
There's no shame in seeking help, both personally in processing trauma or professionally in resolving issues. Feel good for making your best and well-intentioned effort in every aspect of your life!

On the practical level: muster up your confidence/poker face to plainly/without bias tell the honest truth: you are stuck for reasons beyond yourself and have made every effort to resolve them (be it asking for help, getting more/better documentation, ...).

As a small extra: I have found it helpful in the past to explicitly and literally state "I cannot proceed on X until I get Y (from Z, if it applies and ideally if Z or their proxy is present)". That way there can be no doubt that you clearly signalled you stepping away and no longer taking full responsibility for success. Now everyone who was present and could have helped is co-responsible ;)

@999pingGG I had to remove all my packages except one, bitch started working.

@Root Like you said, I can also understand what you going through. Imagining myself a strong person in the future helps me to deal with the short term problems. If you haven't tried already try meditation for a week. I don't get so many anxiety episodes now, it might help you too.
Counting the breath to 10, then repeating and each time my mind starts to thinking, I say to myself, yes thinking and go back to counting again. This practice keeps my unhelpful and anxious thoughts far away.