You and I (but certainly many dissidents!) empathise on that. Since I first started out with Windows 10, so many months ago, I have never looked back. I must say though, in sympathy for many, I have never had a major problem, nor, for that matter, have any of the local colleagues and friends who I have helped.
After the first couple of months, I wiped all of my known family 7/8 installations and reinstalled Windows 10.
Another point to make, I guess, is that in the vast majority of the instances, it has always been a clean install. As a hobby, I did not mind having to reinstall needed software for others.
But the update issue , whilst , again, I have had no problems, has annoyed me to the extent that I have gone into writing and, most definitely, annoyed certain areas of the great Microsoft establishment.
I will not go to the extent of hacking my OS, in order to try and stop the automatic updates. I feel it is a problem which MS should address.