Remember that if you stay out of the job loop for more than 2 years (such as, you take that job at petco) you are now completely "Unhirable" because you are "Not qualified."
Since you know; you might have forgotten how to divide up a subet, how to minimize attack surface, how to look at a stack trace, set up a structured regression test, or how to analyze a packet capture.
Just totally forgot. Your brain cannot possibly retain that knowledge after 2 years! /s
You worked at petco for two whole years! Clearly the entire security field will change so profoundly in that time, and you will be too busy telling some karen which dog-food is better for a large breed dog, that you wont have any time at all to still stay active on your own in keeping your knowledge or skill up.
That is of course, on top of not having that degree. (that you don't have, because you were actively doing the job instead.)
Guess they will just hire from India! /s