The part about interacting with people really resonates with me. I went from a support and repair position to a SWE role. It should have been great. But I burned out really quickly because the contributions I was making were going off into a void (from my perspective). I didn't see our customers engaging with what we built so I had almost zero job satisfaction.

I moved into another support role sort of by accident when I really wanted a sysadmin job but didn't have the years of experience needed to get through the door. I found out (again, by accident) that engaging with our customers directly gave me the feedback and sense of accomplishment that I was missing. I now know that it's an essential component for me. I'm much happier having figured that out.