I knew that my blog was important to me. I knew that it was responsible for finding good friends, connecting with others in the Adoption/Loss/Infertility community and really coming to terms with my own experience with infertility and loss.
Yesterday I realized my blog is almost a physical part of me. And when it was taken away, I ached. I was numb. I was in shock. I couldn’t sleep.
We unfortunately have been reminded this month that there are many, many worse things than a blog vanishing. I felt silly for having such a reaction.
Here’s how it began:
At about 6:00 PM, I checked my email to see if I needed to approve any comments. There was one, so I clicked the approve comment button. Instead of returning to the dashboard, I saw a notice in bright red letters notifying me that my blog had been deacticated, and I wouldn’t be able to administer it. Shocked, I tried to go to my site, and there was a notice that my blog had basically been suspended for violating the terms of service.
I reeled, and immediately filled out the contact form provided by WordPress requesting my blog be reactivated. I filled out a couple of other forms online. I started to get emails from friends who went to my site and saw that it was down. I went on Twitter and asked others for help. I went on Facebook and did the same.
So many bloggers came through for me. Stirrup Queens worked tirelessly and talked to friends who have a lot of experience with the WordPress platform. She also had saved all my entries and sent them to me in word documents so, worst case scenario, I would have a hard copy of my blog to look at. It made me cry to see my entries all together on actual pages. Mel, you are my fairy godmother. I cannot thank you enough.
A number of bloggers, Keiko, S.I.F, Write Mind Open Heart, SlackieO, Bereaved and Blessed, Once a Mother, Wistful Girl, Keanne and many others helped me by searching for answers, or tweeting and RTing my story copying WordPress. Or simply offered an I’m sorry and a shoulder to cry on. Esperanza issued a couple of fiercely-worded tweets that were very brave and much appreciated.
My husband Darcy, who I must admit is not the biggest fan of my blogging, was full of action and sympathetic and reassuring and supportive. He knew how much of a blow this was to me.
I obsessively checked my email until about 12:30 PM, and with no word from WordPress, I fell into a shallow and restless sleep until I checked my email at about 5 AM and found the note from WordPress that I was looking for: my site had been flogged by automatic anti-spammer controls. They had reviewed my site and corrected this and now my blog was reactivated. They were very sorry that it had happened.
Now in the aftermath, I have learned some valuable lessons.
– Back up your blog. You just never know.
– I am looking into self-hosting. It’s time.
– I treated this blog very cavalierly and casually. I haven’t done any updates to it, I didn’t back it up, I used a basic template to create it, I never hired someone to create a cool banner. I thought about it, and promised to do it, but I didn’t. I TOOK MY BLOG FOR GRANTED Y’ALL, like some douchebag boyfriend in college takes his rad girlfriend for granted.
If my blog could sing, it would be singing this Adele song to me:
‘Cause there’s a side to you
That I never knew, never knew,
All the things you’d say,
They were never true, never true,
And the games you play
You would always win, always win.
Lyrics written by Adele and Fraser T. Smith
I’m so sorry, beloved blog. I will never again treat you like Adele’s ex-boyfriend allegedly treated her.
What would YOU do if your blog disappeared? Do you back it up? Feed it, water it? Give it love?
Too Many Fish to Fry 
Bless your heart, your tweets were so panicked. I checked to see if your blog was back at 6 am and was alarmed it wasn’t and I was so relieved to see it when I checked later.
My blog has started to mean more and more to me, and I would be very upset if something happened to it. I need to think more about how best to care and feed it.
Oh J. I had never heard of anything like this happening and I must admit, at first I didn’t really get why you were sooooo upset. I figured it was a mistake, your blog would be back up soon and it would all be okay. Then when I contemplated losing my own space, not being sure if I’d get my 630 posts back, I was devastated. I felt physically sick. And that was just imagining it. Needless to say now I totally understand your reaction. Our blogs are a part of us. If they were to be swept out of existence a part of us would go with them.
I’m sorry you had to go through this but I promise you one thing, it will not have been in vain. Your experience taught me not to take my own blog for granted and to make sure I take the proper steps to back it up. When we learn from the difficulties in our lives, they are much less burdensome – at least I believe that to be true.
I’m so glad you got your blog back. My blog would have been very sad to lose its bestie. 😉
I am so sorry this happened to you- if I lost my blog I would be sick. I just followed your link and backed it up- thank you for posting that. I also am planning on making a physical book of my blog at some point- now I’m kind of motivated to do it sooner than later!
I am so, so glad that your blog came back! I tweeted WordPress, too, but I have no idea whether it helped …
I did actually back up my blog just recently when Mel posted her warning about doing so … perhaps a month ago? Anyway, I’m glad I did! I don’t have the kind of awesome writing you do here … but I do have scores of recipes, many of which I don’t have in any other format. I’ve thought about Blog2Print, but haven’t done so, easy as it would be to do.
Still, I’m the sort of person who would freak out even if I *did* have a backup. And you absolutely deserve a self-hosted blog. 🙂
The loss of your recipes would be a terrible thing 😦 I tried to pin your Irish Soda Bread but it did not work…?
I was so relieved when you were back online.
My blog is part of me, too. I do feed and water it and would freak out as you did if it went away.
I’m glad you have so many people who value you and your blog, too 🙂
Thank you – my husband is backing up my very new blog right now!
I am new to your blog, but just love it! I was upset last night when I couldn’t get to it and did wonder how you must be taking the situation.
So glad to see you “back in business!”
I am behind on my commenting, but saw this & just wanted to give you a (((hug))). Glad the story ended well. I don’t back up my blog but have been thinking that I should — Melissa just posted on this recently too, & you’ve just given me another much-needed kick in the pants to get it done. :p
That is crazy. Maybe I should back mine up.
Blogger deleted mine for the same reason and I too, careened into a full panic. I was luckily in the middle of a transfer to WordPress and had a back up of files, but it was still a nightmare. They finally reinstated my blog days later and just the same, said sorry so simply as if it was nothing.
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