An earlier version of this article was published first on Substack.

The other day, just by chance, I looked at old blog posts, going back week by week. There was a specific one that needed to be corrected. When I got to September 2023, I suddenly saw a post I had not put up. It was some gaming site. Then I realized there were 49 separate posts with the same date. I had been hacked!

When something like that happens, you have to decide who can be the most help. I am not a technical person. I know I need help. Network Solutions is my host. But, of course, they have been bought by Web.com. I pay an entity called My Time Support to help with problems on my site.

Do you know how long it takes to get them on the phone?!

Then, you find yourself speaking with someone in India. They tell you that their name is Susie. The accent is so thick it is necessary to ask them to repeat what they say about every other sentence. They tell me I must pay again because I have already used their service once this month. Yes, I used it yesterday to resolve a problem posting photos. That was Jan 2… Now it was Jan 3, and they said I must wait until next month. WHAT???? There are 49 fake articles on my site. I can NOT wait a month.

Finally, I paid a new amount in order to have them “see what they can do.” I have faith that they will clear up the mess, but it is certainly not making me calm or relaxed to have to speak to this Indian woman about the problem. Over the weekend, being busy, I never checked to see if somebody had corrected the hacked pages. On Monday, I looked at my site and was horrified to see that it was still full of these pages advertising some sort of gaming and gambling. It was much worse than 49 articles. There were something like 198 pages of stuff. I did not call the Tech company, since they appeared to have done nothing. I just sat down and deleted them all in groups of 25 on each page.

It took hours because of distractions, letting dogs in, letting dogs out, going to the kitchen for coffee, more dog stuff, deciding to put in a load of wash, more dog stuff. Finally, I realized I had to leave the house for an appointment at 12:30 p.m., so I needed to hurry. I finished at 12:15 pm. What a waste of my time and energy. Sadly, this happens to people all the time in some guise or another.

Sometimes, I wish I had gone back to school to learn code and all about computer programs. But now it is really too late for me to learn a whole new trade, and it is not a good use of my limited time on earth. Still, I wish I had a friend or a grandson who understood this technical world. I hate paying for a service that is so difficult to use and so unsatisfactory in most ways. It will not be long before my site will be hosted elsewhere.

When I finally got a person on the phone, I was exhausted– after such a long time of pressing different numbers on my phone to get to the proper help. Each time I pressed the correct number for my needs, I got to another voice saying to press four if my problem was related to my website. And then, each time I would press the appropriate number, an AI voice would tell me that I could chat with them online to fix my problem. Well, that is not necessarily true. That online chat can be even more frustrating due to the lag between questions and answers. Don’t they realize what a pain it is? Do they think we have no alternative? They do think that. I would like to start a company for people who need real computer assistance from someone who speaks clearly and slowly. Someone patient, kind, and persistent would be worth money to me.

This is a pipe dream. None of these people cares about their clients. They do think of us as a captive audience.

At 8 p.m. Friday at the start of the long weekend, I received an email that said my site had been shut down due to malware. I tried calling them, but the answering company said, “We are closed for the weekend. Please call back on Monday.” Of course, Monday was not only Martin Luther King’s birthday celebration but also the Inauguration of Donald J Trump as the 47th President of the United States of America. I was hopelessly hobbled until after all of that. Believe me, I knew I would find a way to exit this arrangement. But it had to wait until the next week.

Hurrah!!! I found someone! Now, a local company hosts my site, and I am able to speak to an actual person (not AI) who picks up the phone when I call. Clay Showalter is a real person, responsive and ready to help. And English is his first language. I can text him, and he will answer promptly. It is a miracle. This has made me so relaxed and happy about the future. I recommend you find a new provider if you have tech problems. Find a smaller local company. Why, oh why? Did I wait so long???

Copyright©. 2025 Bonnie B. Matheson