I recently faced a tough situation after being laid off twice within four months, with the last one occurring just a week after I started a new job. I'm a Software Engineer from a developing country with about three years of experience. My journey began during my degree when I did some contracting work for about a year. After that, I spent two years at a small early-stage startup where I had a contract role. I really enjoyed the work and had a lot of ownership, but the company made some poor decisions that led to a reduced runway, and I was laid off as part of drastic measures. I started applying for new positions and sent out around 200 applications. The only significant response I received was from a well-known multinational corporation (not naming it, but think operating systems, not Microsoft). Despite their terrible Glassdoor reviews, I decided to pursue the opportunity since I was getting ghosted by everyone else. The hiring process was grueling, involving almost a month of written assessments, eight interviews, and a coding test spread over three and a half months. It felt like a humiliating ritual, but I managed to pass everything. Eventually, I received an offer that was about 10% lower than my previous salary, but it came with benefits and would look good on my resume. I was okay with it until I received the contract, which contradicted many things discussed during the interviews. I raised several concerns with HR, but they told me nothing could be changed. Four months later, I reluctantly signed the contract. In my first week, I was assigned tasks that required permissions I wouldn’t have for another two weeks, had to complete compliance training, and travel 1,000 km for a visa document, which was a hassle. During the compliance training, I used the company's internal AI tool to help me with some ambiguous questions, and I even informed my manager about it. However, the following Monday, HR joined my one-on-one and informed me that I was being let go for using AI during training. My manager, who had been friendly all week, suddenly turned cold, and the call was over in just a couple of minutes. It's been a month since then, and I've submitted around 400 applications and sent over 150 cold emails, but I've received very few responses. Some rejections stated they couldn't meet my expectations, even though I only included my last salary in the required field. Most roles I see now offer about half of what I was earning, and I'm hesitant to lower my expectations after two years of good pay. I'm feeling stressed and unsure about what to do next. I'm grappling with a few questions: Should I be honest about my last salary when it's mandatory, or should I lower it to avoid being filtered out? How do I effectively anchor my job search? If anyone has experienced a long dry spell like this, what strategies helped you gain traction? I'm open to any advice. Thank you for reading.