Last night while at the Amazing One’s soccer game I was making small talk with a man who’s name I don’t know. We were babbling on about the game, and people I knew who played and all that other fun stuff when the topic of where I worked came up. I told him the company name and that we were a technology company. The next thing he says is “so are you in sales?”

Welcome to one of my few hidden “nerves”. I understand- women in IT, especially in this part of the country are a rarity. There aren’t many of us, there are even fewer who know their shit. I get this kind of thing all the damn time though. It used to piss me off far more than it does now. I busted my ass to get where I am. I dealt with no one believing I was worth a damn in the beginning, I’ve gone thru having to prove myself at every new job, and with those men in the field that don’t believe women have a place in it.

My first job I quit when my boss told me I “never should have stopped answering phones” (i’d started there as the receptionist). There isn’t a week that goes by that I don’t answer a call on the tech support line that some jackass on the other end doesn’t ask to be “transferred to tech support”, or say something else equally wonderful like “um I meant to go to support, did I hit the wrong number?”

There were nights, there were entire weeks in the beginning where I went home and just lost it, wondered if I could do this, if I could be accepted in the boys world that is IT here. There were times I almost quit.

I’ve come to peace finally with the fact that even after 8 years in the industry – I will always get that kind of response from some people. That’s just the way it is. Sometimes though, when someone just refuses to talk to me based not on my knowledge or lack thereof but based simply on the fact that it’s a female voice on the other end of the phone (that has happened before on numerous occasions)- it does still sting a little.