Thanks for this, it really helps give some perspective. It's incredibly difficult for those of us blessed with stable homes and happy childhoods to fully grasp the degree to which such things make us who we are. We can kind of intuit it, and it makes rational sense some of the time, but it's often hard to see the connection between e.g. "I had to pull my alcoholic mom out of a ditch" and "I'm fighting with people all the time". These two things feel disconnected, but it's clear from the literature and from stories like this one that they are not.
>It literally took me until I was in my early thirties and hospitalized with what I thought was a heart attack to figure out I had problems with anxiety, ultra-vigalence, and a hair-trigger temper with associated anti-social behaviors.
Out of curiosity, how does one get from this place to gainful employment in a FAANG company? I realize much of it has to do with luck, but surely there were a number of "stages" during this recovery/relearning process. Did you go to some sort of therapy? What were the major steps in becoming well-adjusted? For example, do you remember the first time you noticed your hair-trigger temper rising, and managed to get it under control?
>I bounced a bit
I actually did too! In my 20's I was very involved in my local MMA gym, and bouncing seemed like a 'cool' way to make some beer money.
All in all it was a pretty good gig for me because I actually had very little exposure to violence before then, and this was a way for me to confront a pretty severe aversion to conflict that I'd been carrying with me for some time. As a matter of fact, this was very much the reason I'd gotten into MMA to begin with, and bouncing was a way to move from an environment with highly-controlled violence (the ring) to a less controlled one (a bar where I had backup, and a technical advantage in a fight). I ultimately ended up in the military doing MOUT operations, but that's a different story, and I digress. My reason for bringing this up is that I remember being quite shocked and horrified at the unbridled violence in some of my colleagues. You basically had three types of bouncers:
1. Calm professionals looking to get the job done and go home
2. Cocky assholes looking to be the protagonist of a badass story, but nevertheless with some self-control
3. Tough-as-nails guys with zero self-control or ability to direct their violence usefully
I think I was mostly in the first category (though shamefully with about 30% of the second category ... I did have something to prove...). It was the third category that horrified me because it seemed like these people weren't even fixing to get into fights; they just couldn't prevent themselves from falling into a blind wrath at the slightest provocation. There's this idea in evolutionary psychology that the emotion of disgust relates to things that should be inside the body (blood, vomit, feces, saliva, etc) finding themselves outside the body. In that specific sense, I think I was disgusted by the third category of colleague -- this terrible, ugly rage that should have stayed inside was somehow spilling out. Quite a few of those guys ended up getting charged with battery over stuff they did on the job, and it all seemed so damn preventable and absurd.
I realize that I'm speaking with someone who may have been this third type of person, and I sincerely hope you don't feel judged. My reason for bringing it up is that I've never fully understood what was going on when these (otherwise super nice!) guys went off the rails. I always suspected there was something like what you described, but never managed to figure out when -- let alone why -- the switch would flip. It was truly terrifying stuff, even for someone who knows their way around a fight, because it all seemed so random and bestial. As an MMA fighter, I was used to clear rules about when the fight started and ended, but with these guys, I would worry that I'd gotten on their nerves without realizing it, and that I'd have a bottle broken over my head before I even knew the fight had begun.
In any case, I'm truly, honestly happy that you seem to be doing well, and I really appreciate this conversation.
> "Out of curiosity, how does one get from this place to gainful employment in a FAANG company"
I was blessed with an above average intelligence. But I didn't have any role models. So it was really about figuring out how intelligent I am and comparing myself to people.
One of my more stable jobs was working as a gas station clerk. The gas station I worked at was one of the few in a more affluent, medical-oriented district. Lots of doctors, nurses etc. Most of them treated me like crap. And just listening to the way they talked to me I was like... these people really aren't that smarter than me.
So I was like what do smart people do? I have 0 family connections--I was the first person in my family to graduate high school--so I figured I'd go to college. That's what smart people do, right?
Went to community college (my high school GPA wouldn't have gotten me into any school with any sort of selection), and succeeded. Graduated with honors, etc. Then transferred to my state's flagship university. Studied something not related to computers.
Got out of school during the Great Recession. Struggled to find a job. Had a couple of other shitty, albiet generally better-paying jobs. Met someone who worked at a FAANG. We were talking and having a reasonably intellectual conversation about what they do, networking and the like. Asked them where they went to school. They said they never went to college; they just taught themselves.
I was like, really? You can do that? If they can, I can. I have a degree from very selective public university. Graduated with multiple sorts of honors. If I learned one thing, it's how to learn.
So I just started teaching myself Linux. Then networking. Then a bit of coding. Got a job helping a start-up-ish company migrate onto AWS. I was underpaid, but underpaid in that world is twice the salary (at least) than either of my parents made in a year collectively. Learned every day. A year later, a recruiter from AWS reached out. That was a couple of years ago now.
---
Your description of bouncing is spot-in. I was a mixture of 2&3. I learned to fight because I had no self-control. I had to learn it, eventually, out of self preservation. But my form of self-control was 'shut off your emotions until you feel dead inside. Then at least you're not a wrathful rage monster.' Not the most healthy strategy, but it's kept me out of trouble. I've gotten better, but still haven't shed a single tear in over 15 years.
---
> '"I had to pull my alcoholic mom out of a ditch" and "I'm fighting with people all the time". These two things feel disconnected...'
Yeah. They're really, really not disconnected. Someone who grows up in that life has no stabilizing influence. They never learn how to deal with problems or actually plan.
Also, a neglectful parent means that you probably got abused. By your parent, an associate of your parent, or both. Predators are really effective at looking at a family and finding a situation into which they can insert you. Then you got to deal with that trauma.
You're also more than likely to grow up in poverty, which comes with it a whole different set of bad habits and impulses.
>It literally took me until I was in my early thirties and hospitalized with what I thought was a heart attack to figure out I had problems with anxiety, ultra-vigalence, and a hair-trigger temper with associated anti-social behaviors.
Out of curiosity, how does one get from this place to gainful employment in a FAANG company? I realize much of it has to do with luck, but surely there were a number of "stages" during this recovery/relearning process. Did you go to some sort of therapy? What were the major steps in becoming well-adjusted? For example, do you remember the first time you noticed your hair-trigger temper rising, and managed to get it under control?
>I bounced a bit
I actually did too! In my 20's I was very involved in my local MMA gym, and bouncing seemed like a 'cool' way to make some beer money.
All in all it was a pretty good gig for me because I actually had very little exposure to violence before then, and this was a way for me to confront a pretty severe aversion to conflict that I'd been carrying with me for some time. As a matter of fact, this was very much the reason I'd gotten into MMA to begin with, and bouncing was a way to move from an environment with highly-controlled violence (the ring) to a less controlled one (a bar where I had backup, and a technical advantage in a fight). I ultimately ended up in the military doing MOUT operations, but that's a different story, and I digress. My reason for bringing this up is that I remember being quite shocked and horrified at the unbridled violence in some of my colleagues. You basically had three types of bouncers:
1. Calm professionals looking to get the job done and go home
2. Cocky assholes looking to be the protagonist of a badass story, but nevertheless with some self-control
3. Tough-as-nails guys with zero self-control or ability to direct their violence usefully
I think I was mostly in the first category (though shamefully with about 30% of the second category ... I did have something to prove...). It was the third category that horrified me because it seemed like these people weren't even fixing to get into fights; they just couldn't prevent themselves from falling into a blind wrath at the slightest provocation. There's this idea in evolutionary psychology that the emotion of disgust relates to things that should be inside the body (blood, vomit, feces, saliva, etc) finding themselves outside the body. In that specific sense, I think I was disgusted by the third category of colleague -- this terrible, ugly rage that should have stayed inside was somehow spilling out. Quite a few of those guys ended up getting charged with battery over stuff they did on the job, and it all seemed so damn preventable and absurd.
I realize that I'm speaking with someone who may have been this third type of person, and I sincerely hope you don't feel judged. My reason for bringing it up is that I've never fully understood what was going on when these (otherwise super nice!) guys went off the rails. I always suspected there was something like what you described, but never managed to figure out when -- let alone why -- the switch would flip. It was truly terrifying stuff, even for someone who knows their way around a fight, because it all seemed so random and bestial. As an MMA fighter, I was used to clear rules about when the fight started and ended, but with these guys, I would worry that I'd gotten on their nerves without realizing it, and that I'd have a bottle broken over my head before I even knew the fight had begun.
In any case, I'm truly, honestly happy that you seem to be doing well, and I really appreciate this conversation.