A New Project - Musings on Tech, Life, and Anxiety

The hardest place to start, is the beginning...

For a long time, I’ve wondered what my next big side project was going to be. At one time tech blogging/vlogging was my side-gig, but I somehow managed to turn that into the day job, which has been amazing in so many ways, and worth mention in a future article! While I give back to the larger tech community via my day job now (and have been for nearly 10 years now!), I’ve been searching these last several years as to what I’d be doing in my free time as a way to continue to give back to the community, and I think I’ve (hopefully) found the answer in this Substack along with the recent launch of AndyOnTech.com!

This initial entry I imagine will be the most difficult to organize and convey, not only due to the complexity of the topic, but because it’s something of a personal topic and it’s also one of the first times I’ve publicly discussed this area of my life. I’ve historically tried to separate my professional and personal lives, but as I’ve gotten older, I realize there is so much blurred between them, that it’s not healthy to continue that practice. This is especially true when you’re a full-time “work-from-home” employee (another topic worthy of a future article on this feed!)

Finally, in agreement with my empathetic side, if I can help one person deal with the things I’ve had to deal with throughout the last 20 years of my life by running this substack, I can sleep a little more soundly at night.

That all said, I’m getting a little ahead of myself. Let’s start with the basics…

What’s this Substack all About?

In short, this Substack will be a collection of content that focuses on Technology (both enterprise and consumer), Life learnings, thoughts, feelings, and dealing with Anxiety. All content will be written and told through the prism of my own experiences and opinions. I’ve been told I’m a good story-teller (whether I believe that or not is subject to another post). Much of the content will be told in that “story-teller” style and will take the form of written content and audio/visual content as well from time to time.

I’ve often thought my career story was somewhat interesting, but I never felt it was interesting enough to talk about it. As with many things in life, things come to us that we didn’t really ask for or seek out, and that’s kind of what happened in this situation. Due to a series of events and some things I was just born with, I found that I’m actually well suited to discuss this topic. While the thought initially instilled some anxiety (funny story that), After prepping a speaking session or two along the same lines, I’ve found I’ve really developed a passion for the subject.

Let me explain why…

What Qualifies Me to Talk About Technology, Life, and Anxiety?

The easier side of this question, the “Tech” part is easy for me to answer. I’ve been involved in the tech industry in some way/shape/form for the better part of 20+ years now. I’ve had some sort of job in tech since my Junior year of high school (grade 11 for those international readers!). I’ve done everything from, L1 desktop grunt work, to designing and building scalable, redundant datacenters both on-prem and in the cloud. These last couple of years I’ve taken to creating community content to help my fellow technology professionals get the day-to-day stuff taken care. This includes creating content centered around the entire Microsoft stack (and lately Security as well!) and I enjoy my work IMMENSELY.

Over the last several years, another area has cropped up that I haven’t really wanted to discuss anywhere, let alone publicly for a number of reasons. but after some speaking engagements that were very well received, and personal input from family and friends, I think i’m finally ready to put this out there in the hopes of helping others like me that suffer from some sort of mental health disorder. So here goes… Let’s get this out of the way:

I have a diagnosed anxiety disorder; one I’ve been unknowingly dealing with (and completely failing to deal with at times) my entire life.

Yes, I have an anxiety disorder. More specifically, I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder. What I’ve found in my experiences with this disorder thus far is that people NOT “in the know” tend to see it as a “catch-all” term. Something along the lines of “Oh, well, they (meaning doctors) can’t explain your specific anxiety, so they just gave you a “generalized” diagnosis.” That’s actually not the case at all.

The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), the key documentation source for mental health professionals, classifies Generalized Anxiety Disorder as:

• Excessive anxiety and worry (apprehensive expectation), occurring more days than not for at least 6 months, about a number of events or activities (such as work or school performance).

• The person finds it difficult to control the worry.

• The anxiety and worry are associated with three or more of the following six symptoms (with at least some symptoms present for more days than not for the past 6 months)

1. –         Restlessness or feeling keyed up or on edge

2. –         Being easily fatigued

3. –         Difficulty concentrating or mind going blank

4. –         Irritability

5. –         Muscle tension

6. –         Sleep disturbance (in that i’m often too anxious to start the process of getting ready for bed)

I won’t list the remaining items as they are somewhat more of the same, but if you’d like to see the entire list you can check out this link.

How Does Generalized Anxiety Disorder Affect Me?

I’ve found in my career in tech that while a definition doesn’t work for everyone, a tangible example goes a long way. So with the above in mind how specifically does GAD affect me? While not comprehensive, a few examples would be:

• Stomach Dropping / Twisting as soon as your open your eyes in the morning

• Subtle, persistent, nagging anxiety all day that just simmers beneath the surface

• Exacerbated Imposter Syndrome (Not downplaying anyone who has imposter syndrome without diagnosed anxiety BTW)

• Fatigue

• Irritability (and associated guilt at feeling irritable at people / situations)

• Always have the feeling of having to prep for something disastrous

• Catastrophizing – in other words, expecting the absolute worst thing to happen.

• The need to socially withdraw at times (and associated guilt at not being able to be readily present sometimes for family and friends)

That last one bothers me quite a bit sometimes. If you’re a close friend, or family member reading this, have you ever noticed these multi-week periods where I seem to drop off the face of the planet? Those are times I’m dealing with an unusually high degree of anxiety on a day-to-day basis (moreso than usual), and I have to withdraw to get my head screwed back on straight. It’s not that I can’t be or don’t want to be social, I just require more “recharging” time during those periods to keep the disorder at bay. I’m thankfully able to handle all my responsibilities for family, and work during these periods, but I don’t have much mental “room” for much else.

Where does the “Life” part of the equation come in?

At first, I didn’t want to speak about this publicly at all due to the, still pervasive, stigma around mental health. However, after working through a few speaking sessions on the topic and getting feedback, I’ve found that not only am I NOT the only one dealing with this, I also have a passion for it. While I’m not a mental health professional by any stretch of the imagination, nor have I ever set out to be one, I can share my own experiences and resources that have helped me. This is all in the hopes that I can help others realize they aren’t alone, and that there is a way you can navigate anxiety while continuing your journey through LIFE. And, if you feel like that’s not possible for you, i’ll be damned if I’m still not going to try and help, cause that’s just who I am….

So Why Substack Andy?

That is a good question isn’t it? For starters I’ve come to find the platform to be really well done, and actually follow quite a few other writers here myself. The platform not only seems to be growing, but thriving as it gives content creators a more direct avenue to the community.

The other reason is….well, if I’m really honest about it, it’s something of a preventative measure. One of my coping mechanisms for anxiety is to bury myself in a complex task. Now, that task could be a super-deep video game (another future topic!), it could be setting up some new technology in my lab, or a cool PowerShell script. In the case of content creation, maybe that’s tinkering with new features on a blogging platform or CMS (Content Management System). Or a tangible example would be setting up a website with Hugo and an Azure Static Web App as with AndyOnTech.com……. instead of actually writing the content itself…..  you see the problem here. Thankfully, in that case, I was able to work through the technical bit and get the new blog in a place where I can easily post content with minimal effort.

Coming back to the main point, Substack helps me remove all the distractions and just write the content….. I don’t have to worry about maintaining a web server, or CMS, or plugins…etc. Hence the choice. Substack also plugs-in well with my preferred writing tool kit and tools, which I’ll be sure to discuss in a future article as many of the choices and nuances are directly influenced by anxiety as well as my passion for cool technology.

Wrap-Up

With that all said, I hope you’ll join me here. While not every post may be relevant to your interests, i’ll be creating each entry to try and make a little something for everyone. If I can help any of those reading feel a little bit better or learn something about Tech, Life, or Anxiety, then I’ve accomplished my goal and look forward to continuing this discussion and contributing to the larger technology community.

Thanks for reading everyone! Cheers to the future!