I had been homeless before, as a kid and as a teenager, so I drew from the lessons there.

I’m also a war vet, so I had the support of the VA through school to be fair.

Anyway, when I finished my GI bill it was back to everything being on me. Just a matter of being frugal af— not only with money but time. Kicking it with friends? Real ones will accept your dedication to the mission vice guilt trip you to keeping you and your family in the same spot in life. Financially, keep those survival habits sharp. Temporally, plan out every hour of the week with flexibility to family and work (sleep, nutrition and fitness are NOT optional). We’re not talking some obsessive compliance to a schedule— just a guideline so you’re not fucking off 40 hours/week on bullshit.

Make a tracker for QA/accountability for your study time. Dedicate part time hours to your grind (read: 20 hours or more/week). Again, make a tracker specific to this objective to log when you actually did it. If you drift from your goals a bit— you’re human. Treat that shit like rock climbing: you’re going to bust your ass a lot, but stop the bs with your belay, reset and use the guideline (your weekly plan) to keep climbing. Make sure you do get some time away from whatever your chosen grind is or you’ll burn out. Keep your resume updated per tool/concept mastered and network.

I worked dead end security guard jobs through college. Now I work in IaaS for Microsoft.

The entirety of a CS curriculum is open sourced. You don’t have to waste a dime on some trash ass boot camp— just step through Udacity or MITs MOOC, then apply what you learned to problems (identify small, existing ones, the more personal the better) and solve them. Showcase your solutions.