How my personal developer “has forced me to" change my mind

My relationship with IT is rather complicated. I have sworn thousands times I won’t code, and learn or make any IT stuff –– although my husband has insisted that I learn programming basics, e.g. Python. Until now, I was sure it’s just enough to have one IT freak at home.

To tell you the truth, having a developer-husband at home is a challenge and sometimes can be really hard. He lives in his own world; his thoughts are always centered on problems he is trying to solve. Additionally, he speaks English with you, but in fact it’s not English you have known for your whole life. It seems to you it’s some kind of babbling or mumbling. And you can think: what on earth is he talking about?

Generally, I have always been a silent witness of my husband’s IT meetings. Sitting in the next room, I unintentionally “eavesdrop” the calls he makes at work. Now when we are closed at home together, I’ve got more possibilities to hear his issues, to be a witness of his frustrations, stress and bad days when something should work, but suddenly stops working without any specific reason or due to some - possibly not related – changes. But I’m also a witness of victorious moments, won battles and wide smiles when he has made the impossible possible, closed urgent issues or finished some fancy feature.

Some time ago, my husband was pestering me for turning my mind to IT. He mentioned his work more often. He tried to persuade me to be his personal software tester. Eventually, he sowed a small seed of curiosity in me. Frankly speaking, I’m stubborn, and I’d tried to convince myself many times that IT isn’t for me. Well, I was pretty sure about that. However, a little nosy person inside me wanted to prove herself, and when I saw a Facebook ad of an online software testing course two months ago, I made up my mind and told myself: “it’s high time I left my comfort zone”.

So I enrolled for that course, and I have to admit it is a big challenge for me. I’m happy some things are becoming familiar, but still it’s a new and unknown domain. Nevertheless, I have become unbearable. I am inquiring into definitions asking: What is this? And that. I’m satisfied that the blurred technical ideas and words are becoming more and more clear. Now I can say it loud: “Having a developer at home is a real blessing. You have somebody who is be able to explain to you the most incomprehensible issues”. Moreover, you can check whether your learning process is appropriate, and the way of thinking is correct. In fact, you have somebody who will motivate you, give you a good wigging, and help when you are to tear your hair out.

Phew, I finally know what this mysterious ‘sprint’ is, and the word ‘scrum’ seems to have meaning now. And I’ve learnt what these jiras, tasks and bugs are. I’ve also learnt more about test cases, levels and types of testing, etc. Although I have been studying for two months, I had a chance to draw a very important conclusion: “I know that I know nothing”; I still have a lot to learn.

Post Scriptum I promise the next post will be about testing. I’ll try, just needed some warm-up. (Hahah!)