New truck drivers questions

My experience from the time when I had 3 months of OTR experience (CDL school paid off, went through the training with a trainer OTR) a few years ago is no company other than those megas wanted to hire me being a newbie.

Smaller companies that paid more or those companies with better reputation seemed to be blinded by the fact I had only 3 months of experience which was less than their 'minimum', one of the recruiters told me the insurance is higher for the company to hire a driver like me with a few months of experience.

I applied with about 20 different companies across the mid-west region at that time, I had 3 months of experience thinking it is good enough to get me out of starter mega companies, HR/recruiters I talked on the phone with kept telling me to call them when I have 9 months, 1 year of truck driving experience. Later being under the impression I gathered 9 months of experience I called one of those companies, the recruiter said she calculated and I had 8 and a half months of experience up to that point, she told me to call her in two weeks because the minimum of truck driving experience her company was asking for was 9 months.

 

I started last year no Experience e had to do otr.