Some things are exactly what they are cracked up to be

Having kids and going to Lambda School come to mind.

1) Having kids is an absolute joy. It also completely obligates >90% of your previously "discretionary" time and permanently reorients your life priorities

2) I attended Lambda School in 2019 when I transitioned out of the active duty army. I wrote code for 40 hours / week for 6 months. I completed several projects on small cross-functional teams of web developers, native mobile developers, and data scientists. It fully prepared me for a career writing software.