Ask HN: Dead man coding.

[deadmancoding]

I am a 26 year old developer that has been working professionally since i was 13. I have severe Crohn's disease and because i refuse to take a colostomy bag I will probably be dead in 6 - 9 months; and I am ok with that. All I know is code and technology because its been my whole (short life) but I want to experience more before I die.

Disclaimer: No this post is not a joke. I used a different account from my normal one for obvious reasons.

So I guess my question is, if you were in my situation would would you do; one last project? or something else?

[nfnaaron]

For fuck's sake, take the bag!

There's no way at all that you can imagine what you might do with your life, what you might experience, what you might give other people.

I'm not religious at all, but if there's anything in the universe that qualifies as a miraculous gift, it's your (you, I'm talking to you, dmc) life.

The universe would be a lesser place without you.

See what happens.

[famfam]

This might sound harsh, but since you are okay with dying at 26 of a disease that rarely kills, my advice would be: have you sought out mental health counseling? Along with your comments about confidence, no friends, girls, and with the pain I'm sure you've been through with Crohn's, and if you've been "working" since 13, I would guess you could very well be depressed. Maybe you would reconsider the bag if you felt better.

[deadmancoding]

Thats not harsh at all. My Chron's is very severe and attacks my organs (kidney and heart) sometimes. I was committed when i was younger (go ahead and laugh) but it was just Asperger syndrome. I don't think counseling would help. I think I am just tired of fighting it. And I am going to take the advice given here.

[pook]

Take the bag, fall in love, and do something worth staying around for. Have children, invest in singularity-inducing tech, fight pirates on the open seas.

You'd be surprised how powerful the urge to live, despite daily I-can't-take-this-anymore frustrations, is when you've got a child's life to look forward to.

[deadmancoding]

I don't think any woman in the world would date a guy with a colostomy bag. So by taking one I am committing myself to a life of loneliness and pain (crones hurts like hell).

[simon_]

Take the bag just to keep your options open.

You can always die later if you still want to.

[kevinelliott]

I'd take the colostomy bag, even if it's an extreme struggle. Then I'd spend the rest of my life doing what really intrigued and fascinated me, like traveling, and meeting new people.

But, since Im not in your situation, I can only guess what I'd do.

Also, keep your chin up, and don't be afraid to ask for help. Meaning, if you wanted to change the world, get to it and ask everyone around you to help you do it. What do you have to lose?

[nandemo]

I'd take the goddamn colostomy bag.

[fleitz]

Since you have elected to die rather than use a colostomy bag, have you considered infecting yourself with hookworm?

http://gut.bmj.com/content/55/1/136.extract http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2009/3/16/3408/66053 http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2006/4/30/91945/8971

[po]

Oh yeah! I read this on kuro5hin a long time ago (whatever happened to that site anyway? So much good stuff there…) and I wondered if it was quackery or not. I have a friend with crohns and I was going to show it to him but I couldn't figure out if the article was reputable or not. Has anyone read the full text of this (or any related) article?

[blizkreeg]

man, please don't think of life as being only code, .com's and retiring by 30s. I understand being passionate about your craft but you're too young to talk like this. I also understand what harm a chronic condition can do to your life, to your confidence, but please, don't give up.

Perhaps you need to re-invent yourself. If that means taking the bag, do it. Think of this as a new life. Shed that old layer, leave that guy behind. Think beyond code, beyond .com. Life is precious, really. There are women out there who do go beyond physical appearance.

You need some mental health therapy too. Your confidence needs a boost and that will surely help. Where is your family in all this? Bond more with some close friends, relatives, family.

Have you tried any alternative, less-intrusive, natural remedies? I can tell from personal experience they can be a ray of light, more often than you think.

[deadmancoding]

I dont know my mom and my dad said just do what makes me happy. Reinventing yourself is easier said that done. My entire identity is based on being a .com wiz kid.

[deadmancoding]

I guess the hard part is that I fee like I wasted my life. The plan was to do .com's and things until 30 then retire. I was well on that road and now this. Thanks for all the suggestions. I literally don't know anything but code. I have no friends only work colleagues. Even when I broke this news people wanted to make sure that all the projects were transferrable.

I cant take the bag. I already have confidence issues and girls kind of think I am a loser. I cant imagine what they would think then (yes i now that is shallow and unreasonable logic.)

[zatara]

Have you seen George Miller's 'Lorenzo's Oil'?

You are a hacker. Take the bag and hack your away out of it. This your last project (or not) and you are more motivated than any other doctor to solve it. It will maybe require you to go very far from your comfort zone, deep into genetics, tissue engineering or molecular biology. So what?

Your solution may benefit thousands. Maybe this is your mission in life.

[run4yourlives]

If you aren't even 30 yet, I can tell you that you only have about 30% of the things you will learn in life in your head right now.

Yes that's right: You're still a little kid, intellectually and emotionally. Don't worry, we all were.

By killing yourself now, you're denying yourself all of that potential knowledge because you figure your not happy with the 30% you already have. That's a fool's game. You'll really understand how little you think you know in the next few years.

You know how you look back at high school and see that all the cool people that got all the chicks and never went to class haven't really done much in their lives since? Yeah, well they never do. The girls that think you're a loser now change their tunes quite dramatically as they hit 30 and realize that those loser qualities you had are actually pretty attractive.

It gets better my friend. So much so that me, at only 35, with a wife and two kids looks at this bag and says, "Meh, doesn't seem too bad, what's he going on about?" I know my wife wouldn't leave and my kids wouldn't care. You're going to find those people.

Of course, that assumes you stay alive to experience that.

[dminor]

Take the colostomy bag. Invent the artificial colon.

And stop worrying about what people think of you.

[MisterWebz]

A few years ago my math teacher told me about his son who had cancer. The cancer somehow damaged his left eye and the eye had to be removed or it would start spreading. So my math teacher took the heartbreaking decision to remove his son's left eye(His son was too young to decide for himself). A few years later, they discovered another malignant tumor in his right eye, so the teacher again took the decision to remove his right eye. Now you could imagine how horrible this must have been for both of them, but his son didn't give up and several years later he created a computer (or was it software?) designed for blind people. Not only did he get rich, but he also helped a lot of blind people.

[AmberShah]

I know it sounds cheezy but when you find someone you love, things like that won't matter, she will only want to help you through it. It sounds like you haven't experienced that yet, which makes it all the better reason not to die.

I think it's a lot of pressure to put on yourself to feel like you wasted your life so young. Give yourself a break.

How about this: take the bag, for now. If life with the bag does end up sucking, you can always find a way out later. But leave your options open and give it a try?

[HeyLaughingBoy]

Instead of discussing it here, say exactly the same things to a therapist: someone whose job it is to listen to stuff like this. I think you're depressed, but what do I know.

Until then, put the computer down and go outside. Look around, what seems interesting? Find out how to get involved and do it.

There must be support groups around this: find out how other people deal with the bags and the impact it has on their lives. Don't read blogs & books: go out and actually talk to people face to face.

[tudorw]

Please reconsider, the bag is technology after all of a kind, and it might buy enough time for a new solution to arise. We live in an unfair world, you should not be having to make this decision, every child knows that appearances are not the important thing, unfortunately as adults we unlearn that...

Go find some women who are not so shallow as to judge a man by his limits, get online dating, it's worked for some my friends.

[neurotech1]

Have you considered an "intestinal transplant"?

http://www.revolutionhealth.com/conditions/digestive/crohns-...

As for the confidence issues, go out and meet people. From experience, shallow people are everywhere, so go past that find people who are not shallow.

[evanwolf]

DMC, if you're looking to borrow goals, try http://43things.com. You can see a wide range of what people have on their bucket lists and new years' resolutions.

If you'd like to make a difference, try to doing at least one good deed every day, a mitzvah. Anonymously if possible. It's harder than it sounds, and will get harder as your physical options become more limited.

Those of us with longer time horizons consider life a balancing act: mixing work, fun, education, beauty, family, community, religion, health. Since you're budgeting your time, consider what sort of mix you'd like. It's your story to write. Maybe 60 art museums in 60 days? Or go someplace where they don't speak much English (France and Spain come to mind) and learn the language?

Last, and this may be the hard one, think of ways to leave this world better than when you came. Does freedom from long term consequences create an opportunity to do something extraordinary if perhaps unpleasant, taboo, or illegal? A dictator you can take down because your life is cheap? A government censorbot that needs a privacy countermeasure you can code because you're not afraid of jail? A homeless person you can take into your home and mainstream because the worst that can happen is they steal your property?

Good luck with your life. Live well. Be decisive. Ask yourself always: "What's the best use of my time right now?"

[jz]

If you work for any employer that actually cares about you, convince them to keep you on their insurance and take a 6 month sabbatical. If they are not sympathetic to your situation, quit your job immediately since they have no regard for your well being. Try the bag and see how it goes. Make friends, travel, enjoy life. Do the things you always wanted to do. Then reassess in 6 months.

Looking at my own life the things that I feel blessed for, have nothing to do with work. After falling in love and starting a family, being rich and changing the world are no longer important. As long as I can provide for my family and raise my children in a way that would make me proud, nothing else matters.

Unplug and try the bag. There is much more to life than business success and $.

[famfam]

Women would rather have a colostomy bag than a douche bag.

[exit]

sadly this isn't true in most cases. women are very much attracted to type-a(sshole) personalities. there are certainly many exceptions though.

[SingAlong]

If you really love what you are doing, you'll just stop reading this comment here and take that bag.

You said you refuse to take that bag, so now consider this situation... you have 3 more days to die and you just created something beautiful & awesome and you want to see it thru. Might be a business or even a time travel machine or even someone you love. Won't you regret that you didn't take that colostomy bag to live long enough to see the job thru and have fun?

Still waiting to take that bag? Damn it! you are forcing yourself to be a loser.

As for women, like everyone else said, i dunno how to blow them off their feet. And sadly so do people who have done it :) So take that bag and get lucky!!!

[isleyaardvark]

Suicide is one of the few mistakes you can make in life that you can never correct.

[exit]

it's also one of the few "mistakes" you'll never regret. death is the end of attachment.

[kimfuh]

No tomorrow means a limitless today. Read everything here, forget about it, then do absolutely anything you want until you die. Between now and then, you might find something to live for. Happy journey my friend.

[shaunxcode]

take the bag! There is a good chance that a permanent solution will be more than viable in your lifetime if not in the near future! Life is far far too precious to not take the risk.

[patrickmclaren]

We're all given a time limit. No doubt that this isn't the first time you've come to terms with how long you have left.

You've asked for suggestions on what you should do before you're gone, I think that's what the people commenting here should be addressing.

My suggestion is make a difference. Change something that wouldn't otherwise be changed. You've made a reckless decision to cut decades off your life, perhaps an equally reckless decision will result in something that lasts a lot longer.

[uptown]

Get away from the keyboard, and go experience the world. Photograph or write about it all, and share it with as many people as possible along the way.

[drKarl]

A 6-9 month trip around the world sounds good

[iwani]

If you wouldn't consider taking the bag at all, I guess one final web project will be it. Make it a meaningful one. Make it reflect you as who you were in this life. Also make it useful for other people when you're gone. We'll all remember you. We'll all remember that there was this one kickass coder who just hadn't enough time to do even more amazing projects

Good luck :)