I'm so depressed and lost, friends. This has not been an Incredible Journey.

About two years ago I was raked over the coals and charged with a white collar computer crime. It was highly-publicized and described in a less shimmering light than what actually happened, as most press releases by the justice department are. My current arrangement with the government involves "special projects" on an as-needed basis, which is why I’m not incarcerated.

I was employed throughout the turmoil — being charged (though, never indicted), and ultimately pleading guilty to a single count of computer intrusion. (In this case, computer intrusion was defined by a cURL request, changing a single query param; no other charges were pursued.) My employer knew the details, kept me on as long as they could: they are currently operating in a shell capacity as of late Q2 due to being unable to raise a round.

During my search for work I’ve always disclosed that I have baggage and can’t pass a background check. Even with this, I’ve had offers put on the table, only for them to be terminated or rescinded at some point. It's not because I'm not telling the whole truth: when people ask, I tell; if they just say "oh what'd you do" and I say "well, according to the government, this, but this is the real story" it's found to be fascinating, sad, and annoying at the same time.

All I know is to be transparent with people, so manipulating the story or the details is difficult for me — I have autism, and my entire existence lives to be transparent and logical because that's just how I'm wired.

I really don’t know what to do at this point. I have rent that’s due, and nothing to fall back on: no assets to cash out (legal defense cleaned me out completely), I live off ramen like a founder, I have the bare minimum everything already. I don’t have any family to go to — my mother, and my only, passed away about this time a few years ago. My friends: well, I am usually the person that is supporting them when they are in crisis.

I am not used to being in crisis.

Being autistic makes it particularly difficult because I'm already so awful at advocating for myself. Perhaps the most frustrating part is that I outwardly appear neurotypical.

Freelancing sites like Upwork are probably my next go-to, even if it rattles my pride and my usual rate, at least I won’t be homeless and starving. I thought I’d post here in case anyone has any resources or ideas I haven’t thought of yet.

For the last 15 years I’ve been building MVPs and shaping up Ruby/Rails applications, working at some big-name Rails shops, many smaller YC companies, and everything in between. I'm active and relatively popular in the open-source Ruby/Rails world, and my side projects here have been met with great admiration. But I'm still in this position. With the tech stack I've pigeoned myself into, I’m unfortunately a one-trick in regard, but at this point I’ll take anything I can get. My next stop is retail, if I can even pass a background check.

Redacted resume, if anyone can help: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gZ_-spX5F2sIyJUuL7firQbWK9xNrSYZ69O_xackCjQ (context: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37265203)

My email, for this journey, is [email protected]