I also have a bachelors in bio. I went into it knowing that a BS would only get me a job in bait shop, if I was lucky, so I had intended to get at least get my masters. But a combination of injury and red tape meant my 5 year degree took me 8 years and it sapped all the patience I had for academia.

Thankfully my degree wasn’t entirely useless as I had the the easiest/most boring on-campus job those 8 years and I tough myself to program on the clock. Then I counted my coding side-hustles as programming experience. So when I found a job looking for someone with a degree and two years experience I was able to get it.