I have to upgrade my Mint install every two years
I know you’re joking around here, but you don’t have to upgrade every two years. You can use an LTS release instead, or, on the opposite of the spectrum, a rolling release.
Release schedule and duration of support should always be factored into the decision of choosing a distro.
In Linux, everything is a file.
So if you have a problem, it will be in a file somewhere.
So logically every problem can be equalled to one or more files.
Therefore it follows: no files = no problems. And no problems = no headache.