Standing in other people's waiting rooms
The waiting game of the interview process at tech companies is a trauma bond that reverberated through my personal relationships
Image by Bonnie Kate Wolf
I learned the concept of standing in other people’s waiting rooms from a TikTok video (from a therapist!) early last year. If you’re keeping score, this is about a year and a half after my layoff. I’d had around 90 interviews at this point. Every process went something like this:
Day 1: Apply
Day 3: Initial email from a recruiter. (They’re so excited to meet me!)
Day 7: Phone screen with recruiter.
Day 9: Email from recruiter requesting a video call with the hiring manager.
Day 14: Interview with the hiring manager.
Day 18: Recruiter email asking to do a case study (It should only take 5 hours—NBD) and to schedule a panel interview.
Day 25: Present case study to hiring manager and a future teammate (45 minutes). Meet with another member of the team you’ll be working on (30 minutes), 2 members of teams you will be collaborating with (30 minutes each), and the director or executive (30 minutes).
Day 32: Send email to recruiter asking for an update.
Day 35: Receive generic email explaining that they are moving forward with other candidates.
This is a full-time job, and it’s not even including the applications that nothing comes of.
The highs and lows you face during a process like this feel like a fever dream, and that feeling is compounded when you’re interviewing at multiple companies simultaneously; keeping track of all of the people I’d spoken with, and for which companies they worked, felt like it was an Olympic sport. These month-long overlapping processes of waiting followed by rejection, led me into a state of deep insecurity, which took me months and some serious grounding practices to overcome.
My loved ones told me to “keep going!” and that I’m “so resilient!” and that “the right one will come along!” Which were all very encouraging and were meant to make me feel better, but when you’re in the process and can see how abusive (yeah that’s right) it is…well, I wish I’d walked away much sooner. That’s the thing about abusive relationships though, you begin to under-value yourself in search of the next high, or next email inviting you to an intro call, because your background is “so impressive!” But at the end of the day, it wasn’t them, it was me who needed to change. I felt like I was dating the same man over and over and over again, but the common denominator here can be found in my own reflection. Don’t get me wrong, this process is abusive and organizations should not operate this way, but it was I who put these processes in the forefront of my life.
It also manifested in other areas of my life, where I overstayed my welcome in multiple relationships, unable to determine where my boundaries were and when it was time to leave. My loyal nature toward loved ones led me to self-abandonment and feeling completely empty every time. I found myself waiting around for people that I had placed tremendous value in, to validate my existence the way I did theirs.
And so, I learned to walk away. I walked away from friendships, partners, and other relationships that left me waiting. I began to wield my “no” like a knife of self-love. I cut away any relationship that was imbalanced and didn’t prioritize me. This cleared space for new people and new opportunities to enter my life, and I’m a better person for it. No more excuses, no more unreciprocated empathy, no more “picking up the vibe,” and absolutely no more making myself smaller for others’ comfort.
All of these experiences have led me here, to this place, where choosing myself is the obvious answer. It feels natural and cathartic to write and share this with anyone who may be in a similar situation, sitting in a prison that you carefully crafted yourself—or in someone else’s waiting room.
“When you say yes to others, make sure you are not saying no to yourself.” — Paulo Coelho