People often say programmers start getting pushed out after 35. That age really does feel like a threshold. For a lot of people, it also happens to be the stage of life when marriage, children, and family responsibilities all arrive at once.
To me, the biggest thing that affects a programmer’s ability to work isn’t age by itself. It’s the constant stream of small, ordinary life matters.
An older programmer
Thirty-five? That age feels far behind me now. Calling myself an older programmer doesn’t seem exaggerated at all.
If I compare myself now with my younger self, the differences are pretty clear.
- Physical stamina: Surprisingly, this hasn’t changed that much. I can still handle long stretches of coding.
- Focus: This has dropped a lot. After about an hour, I usually need a break.
- Coding ability: As long as I keep learning, I still feel like I’m improving. Part of that comes from the help of AI, and part of it still depends on continuous hands-on practice.
- Time available for coding: This keeps shrinking. The biggest reason, in my view, is family-related chores and interruptions.
The hardest part is not necessarily that skills decline across the board. In some ways, experience helps, and learning can continue. What really changes is how much uninterrupted time and attention you can still give to the work.
How to deal with it
The only real way forward is to manage your time more deliberately.
Use the parts of the day when your energy is best for the work that matters most. Rest when you need to, and leave room for some entertainment or relaxation too. If you let work pressure pile up for too long, it usually backfires instead of making you more productive.
It also helps to break a project into very small tasks. Set realistic work items, put them into a ToDo list, and use that to keep yourself accountable.
In the end, it still comes down to persistence. The road may be long, but if you keep walking, you will get there. The important thing is not giving up. Going slower is fine. As long as you keep going, success is still possible.
I hadn’t updated this blog for quite a while. Yesterday I received an email about updating a blogroll link, and that was what reminded me how long it had been. That’s how this post ended up being written.