dontbechad/content/story.md

---
title: "My Bitcoin Story"
description: "The complete story of my Bitcoin story from 2011 to today, including the mistakes and lessons learned along the way."
---

# Don't Be Chad - My Bitcoin Story

This is my personal Bitcoin story--I will dedicate another page to "how I orange-pilled the company I work for." The details below reflect the actual timeline and experiences that led me to create this site.

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## 2011: The Beginning - First Encounters

### Discovering Bitcoin on Slashdot & Ars Technica
Back in 2011, I regularly read tech sites like Slashdot and Ars Technica. It was there that I first encountered stories about "crazy internet money." As a long-time computer geek, I was:

- **Skeptical but intrigued**: I knew digital currencies were possible—ever heard of Flooz?!—but they never worked beyond the issuing entity
- **Technically curious**: The computer science problems that were simultaneously solved in Bitcoin were mindblowing...almost to an unbelievable level
- **Early adopter**: No, I'm not a hipster--can't grow facial hair much at all--but I got interested in Bitcoin before it was cool

### CPU Mining and First Loss
- **Mining method**: Used Bitcoin Core on CPU to mine directly to wallet.dat
- **Success**: Actually managed to mine some Bitcoin (was it really 50BTC then?!)
- **The disaster**: The wallet.dat file was corrupted and lost in a hard drive failure
- **Lesson learned**: Backups are not optional in Bitcoin
- **Cost**: Unknown amount (Bitcoin was worth pennies then, but priceless lesson)

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## 2012: Outsmarting Myself

### Losing A Wallet Password
After losing the previous wallet to a failed hard drive, I began regularly backing up my wallet file(s). However, I also put a password on the file. Let's put a pin in that.

## 2013-2016: The Altcoin Exploration

### 2013: Dogecoin Experiment
- **Discovery**: Learned about "the memecoin to rule them all"
- **Method**: Used faucets to accumulate DOGE
- **Experience**: First introduction to crypto culture

### 2013: ...And I Lost The Password
- **Discovery**: When trying to open the wallet on a restored machine, I realized I didn't remember the password...on a wallet that had multiple Bitcoin
- **Action**: I contacted a wallet-recovery service for assistance in recovering the wallet
- **Results**: They were unable to recover the wallet
- **Lesson learned**: Remember your password

### 2014: Starting (Undisciplined) DCA
- **Platform**: Started monthly Bitcoin purchases on Coinbase
- **Strategy**: Dollar-cost averaging before it was cool
- **Regularity**: October 2014 marked the beginning of accumulation (but it certainly was not disciplined)

### 2014: BTC Hardware Wallet Upgrade #1
- **Purchase**: Trezor Model One
- **Benefit**: Finally had a reasonable signing solution for my Bitcoin (instead of a hard drive and backups)

### 2015: Ethereum Distraction
- **The Turing complete revelation**: "Wait, Ethereum is Turing complete?!"
- **Path taken**: My software development background led me down the "Bitcoin 2.0" rabbit hole
- **Time sink**: Spent way too much time on complex smart contracts
- **Lesson**: Sometimes simpler is better

### 2016: GPU Mining Era
- **Platform**: NiceHash for GPU mining profitability
- **Focus**: Mostly mining altcoins for Bitcoin profits
- **Experience**: Learned about mining profitability and hardware management

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## 2017: ASIC Mining and the Trading Disaster

### ASIC Mining Adventure
- **Hardware**: Got into ASIC mining, mostly Litecoin (L3++ machines)
- **Strategy**: Mining Litecoin to accumulate Bitcoin
- **Complexity**: Miner configurations, pools, exchanges, swaps: hard to manage & maintain
- **Results**: Accumulated Bitcoin at a discount

### Gunbot Automated Trading Disaster
Feeling confident about my technical skills, I discovered automated trading bots:
- **Platform**: Gunbot - popular cryptocurrency trading bot
- **Strategy**: Automated grid trading for "passive income"
- **Setup**: Configured complex trading algorithms for Bitcoin and altcoins
- **Initial success**: Small profits that made me overconfident

### The DeFi Trading Experiment
I got into early DeFi before "DeFi" was even a common term:
- **Platforms**: Various early decentralized exchanges
- **Strategy**: Automated arbitrage and liquidity provision
- **Complexity**: Multiple smart contract interactions
- **Gas fees**: Transactions were very expensive (especially when they failed!)
- **Technical issues**: Smart contract bugs and failed transactions

### The Automated Trading Catastrophe
The combination of Gunbot and early DeFi trading was disastrous:
- **Over-optimization**: Configured overly aggressive trading parameters
- **Market volatility**: 2017 December crash wiped out automated positions
- **Slippage losses**: Automated trades executed at terrible prices
- **Gas wars**: Paid enormous fees during network congestion
- **Smart contract failures**: Lost funds in buggy early DeFi protocols

## "Taking Profits"
Sometimes you've got to let it ride...
- **The selling mistake**: Started selling into the 2017 Bitcoin rally in August
- **Compounded error**: Kept selling through November
- **Ultimate failure**: Bought back in December (the absolute top)

### The Total 2017 Damage
The year of "advanced trading" cost me dearly:
- **Mining profits lost**: Sold early, bought at peak
- **Bot subscriptions**: Hundreds of dollars--almost 1BTC since I bought the license during the lows that year--spent on Gunbot licenses
- **Trading losses**: Automated bot made terrible decisions during crash
- **DeFi disasters**: Lost funds in early smart contract failures
- **Gas fees**: Hundreds spent on failed transactions
- **Psychological damage**: Overconfidence leading to massive losses

### The Psychology Problem
This was my first major psychological mistake compounded by technology:
- **Paper hands**: Sold during the rally instead of holding
- **Overconfidence**: Thought automated trading made me invincible
- **FOMO buying**: Bought back at the peak after selling low
- **Complexity trap**: Believed technology could beat simple discipline
- **Lesson**: Automation and complexity don't replace patience and discipline

### Lessons from the Trading Bot Era
1. **Automated trading is hard**: Bots make mistakes just like humans
2. **Complexity adds risk**: Every additional system adds failure points
3. **Early DeFi was dangerous**: Smart contracts were experimental and buggy
4. **Gas fees matter**: Automated trading can burn through fees quickly
5. **Simple beats complex**: Dollar-cost averaging beats sophisticated algorithms

### One (Somewhat) Good Decision: BTC Hardware Wallet Upgrade #2
- **Purchase**: Ledger Nano S
- **Justification**: Altcoins can't be stored in a Trezor, so at least I put them in a hardware wallet...
- **Problem**: Mining directly to a hardware wallet creates a lot of problems, discussed elsewhere on this site

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## 2018: The Altcoin Circus

### Getting Overwhelmed
2018 was when crypto started getting really complex:
- **Too many projects**: Hundreds of new altcoins daily
- **Information overload**: Couldn't keep up with developments
- **Analysis paralysis**: Too many choices, no clear direction

### PoWH3D & UpStake
- **The pyramid scheme**: Got caught up in proof-of-weak-hands gamification of crypto
- **The promise**: High yields through gambling mechanisms
- **Reality**: Just sophisticated pyramid schemes with crypto dressing
- **Lesson**: Just buy and hold Bitcoin

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## 2019: The First Major Security Loss

### Celsius Yield Trap
- **The mistake**: Moved most crypto assets to Celsius for "yield"
- **The thinking**: "Free money" from lending my Bitcoin
- **Reality**: Centralized counterparty risk
- **The scam**: CEO was a scammer: I lost significant Bitcoin
- **Lesson**: Not your keys, not your Bitcoin (the hard way)

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## 2020: Forced Savings and More Exchange Risk

### 401k Conversion
- **Platform**: Used iTrustCapital to convert retirement funds
- **Investment**: Significant retirement money converted to crypto
- **Mistake repeated**: Still leaving Bitcoin on exchange
- **Risk**: Centralized custodian with my life savings

### The Pattern Recognition
Looking back, I see the pattern:
- **Convenience over security**: Always choosing easy over safe
- **Trusting third parties**: Assuming companies would protect me
- **No proper backup**: Still didn't have secure backup systems

### Heating My House with Miners
In the winter, I repurposed ASIC miners--mostly the L3++--for home heating:
- **Low setup complexity**: Plugged miners in and fed into the HVAC system
- **Heating rebate**: Cost of heating offset by Bitcoin accumulation
- **Noise management**: Custom firmware & modified fans
- **Temperature monitoring**: Automated systems to prevent overheating

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## 2021: The Ultimate FOMO Disaster

### Altcoin Scams
Wanting to make up for losses, I tripled down on mistakes:
- **Elephant.money**: "DeFi protocol" promising 1000x returns
- **DRIP**: Heavily endorsed high-yield project
- **Multiple 'degen' tokens**: In short, ponzis that generated yield for early adopters
- **Opportunity Cost**: Substantial Bitcoin sent to various scams
- **Psychology**: Trying to recover losses with bigger risks
- **Result**: More money lost to speculative nonsense

### Home Mining Upgrade
I added electrical capacity to my garage to keep pipes from freezing:
- **Upgraded electrical**: Added a subpanel to the garage
- **Bought PDUs**: Each with dedicated switches & fuses
- **Bought miners**: Added used miners (S19, S19 Pro, T19) to garage for heat

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## 2022: The Painful Reality Check

### Well, It Started Off Great...
- **Out of the blue**: The wallet recovery guy contacted me and let me know that he'd cracked the password
- **Process**: I sent him my wallet.dat file, he took his cut--20% or 30%--and sent me the rest of my Bitcoin
- **Lesson**: The Bitcoin community is awesome

### The Great Crash
Bitcoin crashed from $69k to $35k, then to $16k:
- **Portfolio devastation**: Down 70% from peak
- **Psychological impact**: Depression, regret, anger at myself
- **The realization**: I had no idea what Bitcoin actually was and how it is, in fact, a zero-to-one discovery of digital scarcity

### Celsius Collapse
- **The event**: Celsius went bankrupt
- **Loss**: Most of my crypto (and a significant amount of my Bitcoin)
- **Lesson**: Centralized "crypto" platforms are extremely risky

### The Learning Awakening
This was my rock bottom:
- **Total losses**: Substantial amount in Bitcoin value lost
- **Psychological state**: Complete demoralization and shame
- **The pivot**: Learn if Bitcoin was really the apex predator or if it was all a scam
- **Decision**: Suck it up, Buttercup

### Return to Dollar-Cost Averaging (but disciplined this time)
- **Strategy**: Regular Bitcoin purchases regardless of price
- **Discipline**: Automated purchases, emotion removed
- **Focus**: Long-term accumulation, not trading
- **Results**: Slow but steady position rebuilding

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## 2023: The Recovery Year

### Executive Presentation
- **Stealth Accumulation**: Used miners to heat conference rooms and sent the Bitcoin to a company wallet
- **Executive Team**: Gave my initial pitch to the executives to really get into Bitcoin (after showing them the company already had some on the balance sheet)

### Bitcoin Focus
- **Conversions**: Traded altcoins for Bitcoin
- **Philosophical Alignment**: Started preferring Bitcoin-only companies
- **Mining**: Purchase of additional Bitcoin miners, including local and remotely hosted
- **Results**: Continued growth in Bitcoin position

### The Education Marathon
Instead of more mistakes, I chose education:
- **Books consumed**: The Bitcoin Standard, Inventing Bitcoin, The Sovereign Individual (I'll post a list of all of the books on this site soon)
- **Whitepaper study**: Read and reread Satoshi's whitepaper multiple times
- **Technical learning**: Nodes, mining, pools, security, privacy
- **Bitcoin node**: Set up two Bitcoin nodes (for redundancy)
- **LND node**: Set up LND to test out Lightning

### Upgraded Security Implementation
- **Hardware wallet**: Blockstream Jade (later upgraded to Foundation Passport & ColdCard models)
- **Multisig**: Geographically distributed hardware wallets (thanks, Matthew Kratter!)
- **Seed phrase backup**: Multiple copies in different secure locations
- **Security hygiene**: MFA everywhere, password manager, TOR/VPN when required
- **Recovery testing**: Successfully restored from seed phrase multiple times

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## 2024: The First Step Is To Admit You Have A Problem

### Attended a Mining Bootcamp
Decided to talk with industry professionals to get a better understanding of the backbone of Bitcoin production
- **Hands-on experience**: Learned ASIC operation, maintenance, and optimization
- **Mining economics**: Understanding hash rate, electricity costs, mining difficulty adjustments, and profitability calculations
- **Industry insights**: Learned about real estate acquisition, differences in power grids, market dynamics, and how financial regulations impair development of Bitcoin mines
- **Networking**: Connected with professional miners and industry experts

### More Education
After a few years without social media, I set up a few accounts to engage with the Bitcoin community:
- **NOSTR**: Tested a number of clients in the (quite obvious) early days
- **Club Orange**: Joined a few groups, including Lifetime, Mining, and Lightning (used to be called Orange Pill App)
- **Telegram**: Joined a number of channels, especially dedicated to modding miners

### Focusing On Helping Others
Realized my painful experiences had value:
- **Community participation**: Helping newcomers in Bitcoin communities
- **Mentorship**: Helped friends, family, and co-workers familiarize themselves with Bitcoin
- **Wrestle with reality**: Started really thinking through the causality chain of every mistake

### Hosted Mining & Dedicated Bitcoin Spreadsheet Modeling
Utilizing the data analysis skills obtained in my career, I started writing spreadsheets to model:
- **Personal Finances**: How Bitcoin affects retirement planning
- **Miner Profitability**: Fastest ROI vs longest "survival" rate vs tax writeoffs
- **Miner Optimization**: Optimized parameters in custom firmware to get more hashrate at the lowest possible electrical cost

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## 2025: Meatspace FTW

### Attended Multiple Conferences
- **Heatpunk Summit**: Best signal-to-noise ratio at a conference I've ever attended -- the thought leadership in this space is incredible
- **BitBlockBoom**: Another great Bitcoin-only conference: many friendships made and solidified here
- **Kansas City Bitcoin Summit**: Great meetup with a(n almost) local Bitcoin group
- **Mining Disrupt**: Proves just how much "Bitcoin-only" leads to better signal

### Presentations
- **Simply Bitcoin appearance**: Appeared as a guest on a live show to discuss some of the topics on this website
- **5th Bitcoin Block Party in KC**: Asked to speak during the event after my appearance on the Simply Bitcoin live show
- **More executive presentations**: Gave the "Bitcoin should be on the balance sheet" pitch to the Board of Directors

### Bitcoin-only
- **Migrated IRA**: Moved from iTrustCapital to Unchained for a multi-sig, self-sovereign IRA

### No Spam Allowed
- **Switched to Knots**: After conversations with Bitcoin Mechanic in meatspace and researching the travesty of Bitcoin Core 30, it was the obvious answer

### Started Wichita Bitcoiners
- **Inaugural meeting**: First meetup was a success, more are in the works

### Personal Progress
- **Portfolio recovery**: Back to a disciplined accumulation through dollar-cost averaging
- **Security posture**: Maximum security practices with redundancy
- **Teaching effectiveness**: Better at explaining complex Bitcoin concepts
- **Psychological health**: Much healthier relationship with Bitcoin

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## 2026: Present Day - Different Kind of Wealth

### Personal Touch
In 2026, I continue to meet face-to-face with Bitcoiners:
- **Wichita Bitcoiners**: Set up a website (wichitabitcoiners.com) to coordinate further meetups
- **Heatpunk Summit**: Presenting with the President of TESSERE about heating commercial buildings with miners
- **BitBlockBoom**: Attending to continue to collaborate with Bitcoiners around the country

### Continued Growth
The Bitcoin story never ends:
- **Ongoing learning**: Lightning Network, privacy tools, technical developments
- **Community service**: More people needing guidance as Bitcoin adoption grows
- **Personal development**: Still learning, still making (much smaller) mistakes
- **Education evolution**: Finding better ways to teach Bitcoin concepts
- **Purpose**: Helping others avoid the pain I experienced

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## The Complete Lessons Summary

### Technical Lessons (The Hard Way)
1. **Not your keys, not your Bitcoin**: The most expensive lesson, learned multiple times
2. **Seed phrase security**: Never, ever store seed phrases digitally
3. **Exchange risk**: Only keep trading amounts on exchanges
4. **Backup everything**: Test backups, verify recovery processes
5. **Address hygiene**: Never reuse Bitcoin addresses

### Psychological Lessons (Even More Expensive)
1. **FOMO kills**: Emotional trading always leads to losses
2. **Market timing impossible**: Dollar-cost averaging beats genius
3. **Get-rich-quick is a trap**: Bitcoin is not a lottery ticket
4. **Patience pays**: Long-term thinking beats short-term gambling
5. **Humility required**: I don't know everything, and that's okay

### Security Lessons (The Most Important)
1. **Security first, always**: Convenience costs more than you think
2. **Assume you're targeted**: Act like hackers specifically want your Bitcoin
3. **Defense in depth**: Multiple layers of security protection
4. **Test everything**: Verify backups, transactions, recovery processes
5. **Stay updated**: Bitcoin security practices evolve over time

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## The Story Continues

Bitcoin taught me:
- **What money actually is**: Store of value, medium of exchange, unit of account
- **The importance of security**: Digital asset protection is non-negotiable
- **The value of patience**: Long-term thinking beats short-term gambling
- **Power of community**: Learning together is better than failing alone
- **The need for humility**: Recognizing what you don't know is strength

My Bitcoin story has cost me over half a million dollars in direct and indirect losses, so...don't be Chad.

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**Want to share your own Bitcoin journey?**
I'd love to hear your story (anonymously if preferred): chad@dontbechad.com

*Last updated: February 2026*