My Swan Song…

To my dear friends, supporters, followers and all my #SPNFamily: Due to recent events over the past

month, both online and off, both positive and negative, it’s become painfully clear the time had come when I needed to seriously re-evaluate my online/fandom life. With so much happening, and so many things to consider, it’s taken me the better part of that month to come to any definitive conclusion; however, after an obsessive amount of self-reflection, many, many conversations with friends that genuinely care about and love me, and too many prayers and hours of contemplation to count, the time has now come to publicly share my thoughts with you.

As most of you know, I was recently blessed with an amazing, full-time, at-home job with a great company and a generous salary, plus benefits, and a fantastic boss to boot! It’s a literal chance of a lifetime that is affording me the opportunity to regroup, re-focus, re-imagine, and rebuild every aspect of my life entirely! As such, it would be insanely irresponsible, ultimately stupid, and after years of prayer for just such an opportunity, I honestly feel it would be downright sacrilegious to do anything but devote myself entirely to the effort it will take to make this endeavor ultimately successful. Unfortunately however, as we’ve all learned from the show we love so much, success does not come without significant sacrifice. In this case, I’m afraid that means, effective immediately I am officially retiring from covering conventions online.

Deep breath…

Whew! Ok, moving on… As I mentioned, the reasons for my retirement are both positive and negative, and related to events both online and off. Yes, my new job was indeed the main reason for it and would obviously be an offline and positive event, but it was not the *sole* reason and to leave it at that would be a disservice to the truth. The fact is, in addition to my job and the changes it will bring to my life, there have been negative events online that my decision was also greatly influenced by. Simply put, the level of hostility and toxicity in fandom today has exacerbated my depression and anxiety to the point that lately, I dread coming online and fear what I will see when I do - and I’ve been feeling this way for a while now. From *my* perspective, the negativity I have witnessed in fandom, though it’s always been there to some degree, has grown exponentially this past year. And frankly, it’s breaking my heart.

I thought about going into all the horrifying things I have witnessed and experienced this past year, but most of you know what’s going on out there already, and those of you that don’t have made a conscious decision not to expose yourselves to it, and I wanted to respect that. But part of me also wanted to shine a light on it in hopes of inspiring a change in the behavior of those that participate in it. In the end though, I honestly just came to believe there’s just not anything I could say that would make any difference whatsoever anyway. So I will only say that in terms of my retirement, the negativity did indeed play a part in my decision. I *could* have just not covered Fridays and rolled back Sat & Sun coverage enough to maintain a good sleep schedule, but why should I keep exposing myself to all this negativity that keeps upsetting me so much? Then I thought about all the people that *don’t* attack. There are so so SO MANY people that *genuinely* appreciate the coverage my team and I provide. THEY are the ones that have motivated me to continue doing this for so long. And I swear, I almost kept doing it just for them. I was thisfreakingclose! It BREAKS MY HEART to disappoint them and that was, without a doubt, the absolute hardest part about this decision. But I found my answer to this quandary while I was reflecting on my journey in this fandom thus far. My journey started the day I started by fighting, even if it was only for my own very existence and through allll the pain I felt every single miserable day of my life. Then eventually, through the acceptance and love coming from the fandom, I came to believe I really was enough; that I was worthy of existing, of friendship, and even all that love that was being offered. Then I was gobsmacked to discover I was actually, finally loving myself enough to accept a great opportunity without self-sabotaging it along the way. And today, I’ve come to realize that #SPNFamily, the *real* #SPNFamily, will always have my back. So I’m putting myself first for the first time in like, ever, and doing what’s best for me, and I know in my heart y'all will understand, because that’s just how awesome y'all are, and I can’t thank you enough for it!

In closing, let me just clarify, I am not leaving fandom for good, I’m just not covering cons anymore. If you’re just following me for con coverage, feel free to unfollow me with no hard feelings at all. But if you enjoy my TL between cons, I hope you’ll stay as my TL will likely be more of the same, though admittedly, I probably won’t be posting as much. It’s not exactly earth-shattering news that Jared & Jensen are my faves, as are Sam & Dean, and I won’t apologize for that to anyone, nor should I have to. For some unfathomable reason, some people seem to think that means I don’t like other cast and/or characters. So, for the record, I plan to continue doing just what I’ve always done between cons: celebrate my faves, and anyone/anything else I personally enjoy, with respect to, and without negativity towards other people’s faves.

Finally, I want to say thank you to ALL my current, and past team members! Everyone that has ever helped me cover these wonderful and fun Supernatural conventions all over the world! I could NOT have been near as successful as I have without you!!!!!! I also want to say that I will always be grateful for this fandom and everything it has given me. You have no idea just how much personal growth I’ve experienced as a direct result of being part of this fandom. I’m looking forward to just being a regular fangirl again so I can reduce the negativity I see and block out the harassment I receive in order to maintain a healthy and uncluttered mind so I can focus on improving my life going forward. Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for helping me get here! For the first time in my life, I can finally say, I’ve got it from here!

All my love,

~sil