I have a similar story. See my first post, the reason I made an account on SN: “The Lighthouse”

I never really shitcoined the way most people talk about having done it, trading and yield farming and believing everything will go on a blockchain.

I bought eth and litecoin when I first started exploring bitcoin, but once I lightly scratched the surface I became a maxi. It helped that I was following a bunch of bitcoiners on twitter (accidentally, mostly for low carb/libertarian stuff).

Don't admit it or Darthcoin will never let you live in redemption

I was always 90% in Bitcoin but I did admittedly dabble in shitcoining in that era.

Wrong question. Right question: why nocoiners / shitcoienrs waited for so long (almost 15 years) to start with Bitcoin?

FFS even if you dedicate just 1h per week to read about Bitcoin and you still have plenty of time in all these 15 years.

I was totally unemployed in 2020 and my life savings were depleting fast. It was horrible and terrifying! I had never heard of bitcoin or crypto and somebody told me that if you do these little learning things on coinbase, they'll give you $5. I thought, "OK, every itty bitty bit helps right now." I did the one for Stellar (a crypto project that I think is now totally dead) and immediately everything clicked. It promised permissionless, global "banking" without banks or other intermediaries. I immediately jumped on board. I had only had money in cash and my own personal home before. This was the first time I ever "invested" in anything, and it was primarily idealogical.

The problem was, Stellar and the other crypto projects I was discovering were fake versions of bitcoin. They weren't really immutable, uninflatable, and fairly distributed. But I hadn't even heard of the idea of bitcoin maximalism, and when you don't even know that there's a rabbit hole to go down, it's hard to begin that research. As 2021 progressed, I definitely felt the tug of truly degenerate crypto stuff. What started as truly believing in the promise of "crypto" (although I didn't actually know the difference between bitcoin and the scams) did start to look ugly. I don't feel I ever behaved in avarice, but that temptation was HUGE. The collapse of Celsius in June of 2022 was the big wake-up moment for me about bitcoin only.

When Hidden Repression came out, that's when everything REALLY clicked. I had always known about the IMF and all the problems they create, but the first somewhat believable solution I had every seen was with "crypto" so it was a pretty painful pill to hear that all these promises weren't actually being delivered. BUT, everything that I was excited about in that Stellar tutorial was ACTUALLY true of bitcoin...and so much more!

But this is also why I'm so ready to make sure we take seriously claims by folks like Whitney Webb. We should be vigilant about mining pool centralization. We should be vigilant about supporting privacy or self-custody advocates who get thrown in jail. Shitcoinery is definitely a plague I'd love to see stamped out, but I don't want to assume hyperbitcoinization is a given either.

OK, that was supposed to be my story, but it ended kind of preachy. Moral of the story, don't be like me. Don't assume you've arrived just because you made it to bitcoin the way I thought I arrived just because I made it to "crypto."

I think it is part of the process. I had to learn all the lessons before I finally settled on Bitcoin only.

I don't really get into that distinction. Whatever has value has value.

I was never a shitcoiner: I didn't make it!

I came across bitcoin in 2017 but gave neither attention nor time to it. It was 2019, when economic hardship struck me so hard that I decide to look for a way out. So, I started by reading books, especially finance and money. Because crypto was the reigning thing around me back then, I downloaded a book called "Cryptocurrency Investing for Dummies." I studied it, preparing myself for investing in cryptocurrencies. But, because the book kept making emphasis on bitcoin as the first and most expensive of all, I decided to investigate more on it. While I was searching for books on bitcoin, I stumbled on these two books: THE LITTLE BITCOIN BOOK and THANK GOD FOR BITCOIN. By the time I finished reading the books, my life got transformed, forever. There was no need for investing in "crypto" anymore. I fell into the bitcoin rabbit hole, and I'm yet to see the end of it. Although, I knew it has no end. I just kept learning.

Did I become rich and wealth? NO. Not yet. But I'm grateful that I did discovered the road (i.e., bitcoin) that leads to genuine wealth. I like it because it has nothing to do with zero-sum game like fiat. Bitcoin indeed help me changed for good. And, I believe, it equally changes the world for the better.

Bitcoin, not crypto!

Your post does bring back memories from a not so distant past. Shitcoining appeared exciting initially until I came to the realization that I was running around in circles and losing money while at it. Lol. I eventually realized that there is only one true coin that has no second best and that of course is bitcoin. Glad I found my path back to the orange light.

Ariiiise chikun

(Litecoin was my first. I literally thought they were like cents to Bitcoin's dollar)

Bonus cringe moment: came across hat @BTCsessions video on how many sats you have by just holding BTC vs altcoining. Immediately dismissed because I thought it was "close-minded" and it was ridiculous to compare 3-10x gains to 10-100x gains.

I repent.

I never invested money into the memecoins but I did waste 15 years not buying enough bitcoin

My experience was similar, I entered this world out of curiosity and necessity, I earned my first sats through faucets and as a newbie I finally lost everything in shit coins. The good thing is that I also learned and I only focus on Bitcoin.

Oh man, your story reminds me of my own misstep back in 2012 when I got into Bitcoin then fell for the hype around Litecoin being the "silver to Bitcoin's gold." It seemed like a smart hedge at the time, with Litecoin’s faster and cheaper transactions, so I swapped a big chunk of my Bitcoin for Litecoin. Big mistake. When everything crashed in 2013, Bitcoin eventually rose again, but Litecoin didn’t deliver, and I sat there watching, wishing I’d held onto my BTC. Like you, it took me a while to realize that Bitcoin’s fundamental.

I never bought shitcoins. I got some as shitcoins through gift or a competition which I won and I did hold them for two years because they were profitable to hold. After two years when they became very less profitable I sold them and bought Bitcoin with that money. When I recieved them, they were around $500 but when I sold them, they were around $3k. The price of Bitcoin at that time was around 25k so all in all it was a lucky profitable gift.

I think it's a bit of an uncomfortable subject perhaps... For me the term "Shitcoiners" is new and I'm understanding it well until now... before the first thing I did in my morning break was to enter S.N in order to read and comment on all the articles that I had time for... because at that time I thought this is my primary way of accumulating Sats... but then you mature and realize that if your vision is of the future with a real asset for your family and your retirement... you're not going to fill much with just S.N..!! also you see that this is a social network (if you can call it that) made to say what you think and support those people who invest time and effort to provide guides and good information to others... now if you are attentive as I did before just commenting to get sats then I am a reformed "Shitcoiner"!

Not this guy...

The long someone stay in “crypto” eventually will end understanding and love Bitcoin.