So, if you’re reading this, you probably know that I’m a photographer. I haven’t shared what I’m about to tell you with many people but I guess if you take the time to read my blog, you can hear about one of the most devastating things that happened to me over the summer.

I lost all of my photos from the past 2 years. Work related AND personal. My pregnancy photos…. gone. Our family vacations… gone. My favorite sessions that I have captured for clients… gone.

It was all gone. 

There was a thunder storm over the summer and the power started to flicker. I decided to go turn off and unplug my computer for safe measures. The next morning I turned it back on to finish editing a session and my iMac couldn’t read my external. Hmmmm weird…. let me try and plug it back in. Nope. Didn’t work. Let me restart the computer…. nope. Nada. I finally found myself driving out to Cary to best buy for their geek squad. The hard drive was registering on their computer but the files weren’t accessible. They could send it off to a repair company but had no guarantee of a fix. I was getting estimates of $500 to $3000 dollars to try and repair the hard drive. I was even willing to pay it.  I decided to try local. I dropped it off at another repair company in Cary and waited 4 excruciating days to hear the outcome. Almost 30 weeks pregnant and I was hysterical and distraught.

I had a ransom virus. There was no hope of recovery no matter where I sent it.

I was naive in the thought that my hard drives would never crash. I didn’t back it up. I know. ABSOLUTELY stupid. Like sheer stupidity. Dumb. I hated myself for being so dumb.

I lost everything. All of my memories had vanished overnight EXCEPT for what I had uploaded to Facebook.

I post a lot to Facebook… especially since Bennett has arrived. Mostly pictures… but I have a fondness towards the site because it preserved my photos and memories from the past 2 years. I can actually download them from Facebook and am able to print 4×6’s from it. My pregnancy photos were SAVED. Our cruises… SAVED. Our memories… SAVED.  Granted out of the thousands of pictures I take from vacations, only the best of the best were uploaded to Facebook but I will take some over none.

Now, regarding my photography work…. I can’t use my old work because the quality isn’t the same. I can’t download the jpg’s from Facebook to make promotional work… nothing. I did lose all of it. The silver lining of losing everything though? It has pushed me to get out of my comfort zone. I have had to hustle to get new business because I can’t rely on what I’ve done in the past. It was like starting over. I can’t just go into my archives and pull an old picture…. I have to go out and create NEW images. I have to get NEW clients. I have to continue to be creative, learn, move FORWARD.

It was honestly a wake up call but it has been a hidden blessing. My business has actually benefited from losing everything.

Now? Everything is like tripled backed up. Extra hard drives, online storage. You name it? I am doing it.

As a photographer, photos are my thing. I take SO many photos. It’s just what I do. It doesn’t matter if it is with my big camera or just a cell phone. I love to document my life. I was in a car accident in 2005 that was life changing. My memory was affected because of it. I have missing chunks of my life before the accident. My short term memory isn’t the same. Memories of friends from just the year before? Gone. You could tell me something and hours later I would have already forgotten the conversation. As the years have passed, it has improved but I still have to write everything down.

Photography helps me remember. It’s just another reason why I am so passionate about it.

So, now you know just another reason why I unashamedly upload so much to Facebook and this blog. It all helps me remember things that I don’t want to forget.