Years ago I used Adobe Photoshop and Creative Suite, but never bothered with iPhoto, as it was then. After Aperture came along I found myself ignoring CS 3 altogether and eventually the next time I moved to a new computer I simply left Adobe behind and never bothered updating. By the time they were going to a subscription model I was perfectly happy with other software and still am. I wasn't interested in going to Photos when Aperture bit the dust and hung on to Aperture for a year or so, putting off the inevitable as I tried out various programs as potential replacements. I'm not someone who does a lot of layers and a lot of composite images, I just basically edit whatever it is I've shot and that's it. I tried Capture One and found it way too much -- really overkill for my needs or skills, tried a couple others which names I don't even recall now and found them lacking.... I did like Luminar 3, especially their wonderful erase tool, but wasn't always happy with the program otherwise. Eventually I stumbled on DXO PhotoLab 3 and found myself at home at last. Now I use that (current version being PhotoLab 4) as my primary editing tool, and then I sometimes jump into the new Luminar AI for a quick finishing up or if I need to do a bit more with the "healing" or erasing function. I also use Topaz Gigapixel from time to time and Topaz Sharpen AI from time to time, when an image needs just a bit more finessing in one way or another.
I still am not fond of post-processing, but it is a necessary evil when one shoots with a digital camera and especially when one shoots in RAW as opposed to jpeg. Over the years editing programs have become a little more intuitive and I've slowly improved a little more in my skills. I'm still much happier just being out there shooting the photos rather than dealing with them afterward, though!
I never allow a program to take control of my images. When I have finished shooting, I stick the memory card into the SD card reader that I keep plugged into my desktop, and then download all the image files into a folder on the desktop. From there, I'm free to take the files into whatever program is appropriate and I move forward with the editing. I SHOULD, but usually don't, review and cull the images in PhotoMechanic prior to processing them (usually wind up doing this later at another time). Once finished with whatever it is I'm going to do to the images, they go into a new folder on the desktop and then into various other folders within my Pictures folder (they are categorized and arranged by month, such as Images Edited April, 2021, Photos of the Week [52-week project], arranged by weeks of the year, and RAW image files, arranged by month and date. Each month or sometimes more frequently I back these folders up on external drives, and older files from years past are on archival external drives while right now I'm working with a new set of archival drives with image files from 2020- on. There are multiple copies of the archival drives and the current backup drives, and each month one copy goes to my bank safe deposit box. Redundancy is key!