How I Learned to Code Well Enough to Get Paid in 6 Months

Not a bootcamp grad story. Not a CS degree story. Just a regular person who wanted to change careers.

Where I Started (Month 0)

Background: Non-technical job, no coding experience, 30+ years old.

Motivation: Saw a friend's salary after switching to tech. Got jealous. Got curious.

Starting point: Zero. Couldn't tell HTML from Python from SQL.

The Plan That Actually Worked

Month 1: The Foundation (2-3 hours/day)

Week 1-2: HTML & CSS

FreeCodeCamp's Responsive Web Design certification

Built a personal portfolio page (ugly but mine)

Key insight: CSS is harder than it looks

Week 3-4: JavaScript Basics

JavaScript.info (free, excellent)

Built a to-do app, a calculator, a simple game

Key insight: Variables, loops, and if-statements are 90% of programming

What I did wrong: Tried to learn too many things at once. Picked up React while still struggling with this keyword.

What worked: One resource at a time.…