A little over fifteen years ago, I started writing a blog. I loved lifting the curtain on my personal life and sharing what was going on as I learned how to be a father, handled a vindictive ex-husband who exhausted my family while he tried to hurt my wife (not caring that he was doing a lot of collateral damage to my then step-kids at the same time), and about my almost-daily struggles to figure out why I had a once-promising acting career that had stalled out and wasn’t going anywhere.
I’ve written hundreds of thousands of words since then, not just in my blog, but in books and for places I was honored and privileged to contribute to, like Suicide Girls and the AV Club. Over the last year or so, I’ve put about 71000 words into the manuscript of my first novel, and I’ve wasted far, far, far too much time on Twitter.
I really hate Twitter. It was once promising, and I feel like it still does some good, but on balance, it enables harassment and evil and cruelty at least as much if not more than it helps things change for the better. I feel like it has broken our society, and wrecked our social contract. I feel like the board at Twitter, and its CEO, Jack Dorsey, know this, but they’re too busy profiting from their inaction to care. May history judge them all the way they deserve.
I’ve been thinking about how bad Twitter has become, and how I can’t imagine asking people to follow me there like I did when it started so long ago. I’ve been thinking about how angry and sickened I am by the Fascist who is currently occupying the presidency, and the people he has surrounded himself with who enable and encourage him and his hateful conduct that goes against everything America has always represented to the world (except for the shameful and indefensible parts of our history, like slavery, Jim Crow, and Internment).
I’ve been thinking about how I want to tell silly and even hearfelt stories in my blog. I’ve been thinking about how I want to share how wonderful my kids were on Father’s Day, (which they know I don’t care about) when they took me out to lunch and ice cream anyway, because it was an excuse to be together. I want to write about how much I love my daughter in law, and how happy she makes my son. I’ve been thinking about how I want to write about how grateful I am that, even though my kids are 28 and 26, and not children at all anymore, they still want to spend time with me. I want to write about how great it feels to know that all the suffering we all went through when they were young didn’t affect our family in the way it was designed to. I want to celebrate that the worst person in the world, who made our lives a living hell, is relegated to a rarely-remembered footnote in our family’s history, who is living the life he deserves. I don’t write about these things, now, because they are deeply personal, and I don’t feel like it’s aways necessary or even smart to pull the curtain back on my life, or the lives of my family.
And yet … I will write about something personal, real quick, because it’s a story I’ve wanted to tell for almost ten years:
Ryan was 19, and was home between semesters of college. He’d had a real difficult year while he was adjusting to school and being away from home, and his mom and I were doing everything we could to support him while he went through a challenging growth phase.
I had just bought this laser star projector from Think Geek, and I wanted to show him how cool it was to spray little green points of light across the ceiling of our living room, and just lay there, watching them drift around.
So we turned off the lights, stretched out on the floor, and did just that. The house was quiet, and the only sound was the soft whirr of the fan inside the projector.
We imagined constellations, and named them, but were mostly quiet, too, until Ryan, still looking up at our imaginary planetarium, said, “So I’ve been thinking about something…”
“Oh?” I said, “What’s that?”
“I’ve been thinking a lot about how I am who I am because of you. I love science fiction and literature because you introduced it to me when I was little. I care about people because you taught me to be empathetic. You have always been more of a dad to me than my dad ever was … and I was hoping that you’d make it official, and adopt me.”
One of the laser points of light drifted across the ceiling, like a shooting star. I watched it and tried to process what I had just heard. Ryan’s dad had spent his entire childhood trying to convince Ryan to reject me. He wasted their whole lives to that point trying to make them pick sides in a battle that neither one of my kids wanted to be part of. At times, it felt like he was going to be successful, and a day would come when the children I did not make, but did raise as if they were my own, would never speak to me again.
And now, a day had come that I always dreamed of, but never actually expected to happen.
“Is that okay?” He asked. I didn’t realize that I’d been quiet for close to a minute, while I was trying to process that this was real, that this was really happening. I didn’t realize that tears were streaming out of the corners of my eyes, down the sides of my face, and pooling in my ears.
“Ryan, I would be honored to adopt you,” I said, thickly.
“Is it okay if I change my name, too?” He asked.
The tears turned to joyful sobs, and I told him that I would love that.
It took months, and a lot more complicated paperwork that you’d probably expect for an adult adoption, but we eventually found ourselves in the same courthouse his soon to be out of our lives forever biodad had dragged us into for years. In the same place I had to listen to lies about me and my wife and our relationship with our boys, we stood up in front of a judge, my godmother (who came all the way to Pasadena to be part of it), his mom and brother, and a couple of close friends, and we swore that we wanted to legally become father and son. Years later, I got to do the same thing with Nolan, who didn’t choose a poetic moment under imaginary stars to ask (he isn’t a writer, like Ryan is) but asked me during lunch at Comic-con! Both days were the sort of thing I would have rushed home to write about when they were young, but I kept it just for me and my family, until now, and not just because I wanted to respect their privacy as adults.
These are the stories that I miss telling, because these are the stories that don’t just make me happy, but are the stories that I believe can resonate with readers.
Like, right now, I am here to tell my fellow stepparents that you are doing a wonderful thing, being a loving and supportive parent to your kids, whether they share your DNA and name or not. (In fact, for the first 15 years we were together, I told the boys that they were Wheatons in everything but name, and if they didn’t want to take that step, I respected that. I would love them no matter what.) I remember how hard it was to not take the bait when their biodad would tell them some outrageous lie about Anne and me, and instead just tell them that I was sorry they had to hear that, and remind them that I loved them no matter what. I hope that by sharing the story of my son asking me to officially become his father, a stepparent somewhere who is having a hard time, or a stepchild who is wondering if they can ask about adoption, will feel a little less alone and afraid.
Shitty people like to try and hurt me by saying that I raised someone else’s kids, like that’s somehow a dishonorable thing. I feel genuinely sad for those people, if they truly believe that, but when they’re just being cruel, I honestly don’t really care what some asshole stranger on the Internet thinks about my relationship with the people I love.
Which brings us back to Twitter. I took it off my phone months ago, because I didn’t need to give my time and energy to garbage humans whenever I had a free moment. I turned my mentions off a couple weeks ago, because even though I’m blocking over 25000 accounts, new shitty people are popping up every hour of every day, and taking advantage of their ability to reach into my life and try to hurt me. It sucks to miss the fun stuff, the “yes and” to my dumb jokes and puns, and the interactions with good and kind people that I’ve absolutely loved since I created by account. But as I wrote recently, unless and until Twitter takes harassment and all its systemic problems seriously, it causes more harm and unhappiness than anything else. It’s not you, good and kind people, it’s me. And it’s Twitter. But we all know that, don’t we?
I have work to do. I have stories to tell. I have a wife and children and pets to spend my time with. I have a lot of deeply personal things happening in my life right now, that I have no intention of talking about. I have people in my life who are far more important to me than Twitter or blogging.
I have been trying to quit Twitter for close to two years, but I can’t, because being there is important to people who want to work with me. I can’t because part of me holds out some desperate hope that it will get better. I can’t because there are three million people there who seem to care about what I do in this world, and it’s really stupid to abandon them, when I have creative projects coming up that I think they want to know about.
But my God, people, Twitter is broken and it’s destroying our ability to see the humanity in each other. I know that I am guilty in that regard, but you’ll have to forgive me for how much I hate Nazis.
See? I did it again.
I know that this website started out as an unfiltered view into my world, but I’m old now. My kids are grown. The people I work with read it, and my employers are giving me increasingly restrictive agreements to sign before I can work with them, which I kinda need to do to support my family. I’m not going to be able to go back to the way things were, because the world has changed so much, but maybe that’s for the best, because time I don’t spend here is time that I can spend in my imagination, writing the stories that I want to write, that I hope you want to read.
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Wil
Social Media is a funny thing. People are more comfortable attacking someone in this realm than in a face to face or even voice to voice setting.
So I’ll do my bit to break the habit:
We’re about the same age and I’ve watched a lot of your work. Thanks for all the hard work you’ve put into it . It’s provided hours and hours of fun to me (and a lot of other people).
Thanks for being you!
I must have found your first blog shortly after you started it when I myself was in a dark place in 2004 and something about your candor and style got through to me. I’ve been a regular reader ever since and I know I said this years ago when you signed my “white album” copy of the Just A Geek audiobook but I wanted to repeat it. Thank you. Your writing has showed me depression isn’t my fault, that humans are complex and messy and our relationships take work but that they’re worth it in the end. Thank you for writing, Wil.
That was a beautiful story. ❤️ I found you via fark well over 10 years ago and have been a regular ever since because I love your writing and storytelling. You are a good, kind and generous person and I’m thankful to have you. You do as you need, you don’t owe me your time, though I’m thrilled when you share your time with me. There’s only so many pieces of yourself that you can give away before there’s nothing left for you.
I will continue to follow you around the Internet, call you uncle Wil (for the kids- you’re the same age as Damon) and send you pics of chubby faces and dancing barefoot in the wild.
Although last week when my boss gave me a new client, I said what the shit?! I’m sending the awkward yeti on vacation?! His dad is adorable.
And, I wish my kids had a grandpa like you. My dad came over last week and sat on my patio reading a book, ignoring Alice when she cried to be pushed on the swing. My mom asked him to keep an eye on her, and he said, “which one is that?” And after almost 5 years I can’t tell you how much it hurts that he can’t tell my kids apart and won’t even make an effort.
Twitter is good for news but not much else. I followed you when you had 4,000 followers. I remember the good old days.
Tonight was date night with husband and we played video games at pinball Pete’s and ate poutine and enjoyed each other’s company. I walked past the vault of midnight and remembered that rainy fall day when you were in town. It was near 10 pm when we headed home but still light out and still warm. Sometimes summer makes me so happy I feel like I can’t take anymore happiness.
I will say I miss you on twitch and RFB, to to add lot shit to your list but to let you know it’s something I enjoy.
Thank you for being a part of my world. ❤️
Mr. Wheaton,
Twitter? It’s the combination of Orwell’s two-minute hate and the Krell mind machine from “Forbidden Planet.”
I don’t mean to intrude, but you really seem to be letting the id-monsters of Twitter get to you. I’m not trying to give advice, and I’m not trying to minimize, but you can never please Twitter. It’s like trying to achieve the perfect body. It’s like high school, but you finally DO have a permanent record. Anything you ever do or say is waiting to be thrown back up at you years or decades later. There’s always someone criticizing you. Please don’t let them get you so wound up you come apart. If you have something to say about the Chris Hardwick accusations, that’s your business. If you don’t, that’s your business too. I’m a traditionalist: you have the trial before you find someone guilty.
Wil, I have been reading your blog since its inception and have appreciated your writing about your struggles and accomplishments over the years. Some of your writing help me get over some rough patches of my own. Even though you don’t write here much anymore, what you do write is always thoughtfull.
I was there for one of my relatives sons when his father split and was there for him when he needed me throughout his teens and twenties. I’ve never regretted a moment.
Thanks for putting yourself out there.
I crash at WWDN all these years (Jesus Christ, how many?) because I can put my feet on the coffee table and occasionally pee in the bathroom sink and no one calls me on it.
We want to read them very much. I’ve often found the more personal ones to be inspiring and uplifting in the best way
Well I’m crying like a baby right now. That’s a beautiful story and you and Anne raised very fine, wonderful young men. I’m glad I’ve met them, even if only briefly, and seen your family interact. There’s so much love there.
I plan to adopt (one magical day when that’s feasible for me) and I know I will go back and reread some of your posts about your boys as I navigate making certain my future kids know that blood isn’t what makes a family; love is.
Hi Will. I’m the child of a step father who stepped in when my biological father gave up, ran off, left us in the lurch. My dad’s gone now, and he wasn’t perfect, but he didn’t have to be. None of us are. I’ll never forget that he was the one who was there, who showed up, who came back, who gave me his name, who folded my sister and I into his family. You didn’t raise “someone else’s kids” you raised your kids. And the adults they became proves that.
Hear, hear on Twitter. I truly feel like social media has utterly ruined the Internet, and our world as well.
I love your adoption stories 🙂
I adore you and Anne both so much, and enjoy your stories about the boys and your dogs and cats and your work both as an actor and as a writer (and Anne’s new burgeoning writing career!). I’ve loved you as an actor and you and Alyssa Milano were the first two famous people I followed on Twitter, back when I was still on Twitter. I couldn’t agree more with what you’ve said about Twitter and it is why I left. When I started on Twitter, I enjoyed it so much. It was fun and lighthearted and I even learned a thing or two. I got to reconnect with you and Alyssa, two people from the television of my younger days. I got to see the evolution of Alyssa into an amazing mother and the evolution of you into an even more compassionate and wonderful human being than you already were. Because of Twitter, I got to “know” Anne who is funny (no, hysterical!) and just as wonderful a human being as you, and I learned about Jenny Lawson, the wonderful Bloggess! But Twitter took a dark, dark turn and as long as Jack Dorsey is making money hand over fist, he doesn’t care one bit. So, I left. There is a horrible, horrible room in Purgatory, or Hell, or wherever sucky people go when they die that has two reserved seats, one for Zuckerberg * one for Dorsey. I still hold out hope that they’ll both snap out of it and realize what they’ve done and immediately reverse course, but money does horrible things to people.
But I still check in with your blog, and Anne’s (including Rescue Pets & Vandal Eyes!) and the amazing Bloggess. I don’t have the exposure to all of you like I did during my Twitter days, but it feels healthy to be Twitter-free, especially in light of my depression-lying brain!
Keep doing you! We need more wonderful people like you, Anne, Alyssa, and Jenny in the world, now more than ever!
I do enjoy your posts. You share those moments when you are at your most vulnerable and you show us how you survive. I look for the same courage in my writing and find myself lacking. So I read your posts from top to toe, thinking to myself ‘Look, see, this is how it can be done.’
Thank you. You are an inspiration.
Thank you for sharing the story of your sons. It was and is beautiful.
Social media is a joke. Life is such a dichotomy right now. On one hand, bullying and harassment are being exposed and rooted out for the first time in American history by the younger generations, which is way overdue. On the other hand, there are growing segments (Twitter, Facebook, etc) that are creating and nurturing some of the worst bullying and harassment in recent times. (Ironic that it’s the same young generations responsible for this as well) That being said, you have to take responsibility for your part in this. You have decided to be a public person and you have put yourself out there into this shit storm of Twitter, blogs, Facebook, etc. I remember back when you first started blogging and writing. You were working every angle of social media, the internet, the entertainment business to get your work in front of the people, to ‘get something going’, which at the time was a smart way to go. Now that you’ve attained a certain level in your field, you are surprised by the trolls and the vitriol that come along with it. (Always kind of funny to me that the increasing level of sycophants and fan(atics) are okay, though) The solution is to reevaluate the career you’ve chosen and perhaps move away from relying on the public for your affirmation, validation, income, etc. Maybe something behind the scenes. Maybe something altogether out of the entertainment business. You used to say that a real low point for you was when a waitress called you a “former actor”. Maybe, that is exactly needs to happen for your physical and mental health. It wouldn’t be the end of the world. You’ll live. We’ll live. The birds will keep chirping…but you might have some peace.
Love love love this!!
I’ve been thinking about Mr Wheaton’s issues with Twitter . . . I used to train university professors on web course development. They always liked the asynchronous communication function in their courses and universally agreed it brought a needed dimension to class participation. Many of the students who were reserved, introverted, and overwhelmed would often be crowded out by the outgoing, social, and confident ones in class. But something amazing happened when they communicated in writing at will. Some introverts communicated 100% more than they did in class and were often interesting and thoughtful and engaged which you may never know from in class participation.
Our software came with a gronky, non-user-friendly-resource-sucker plug-in for synchronous communication affectionally known as the chat room 😀. In the olden days, we may not have been able to run more than a few chat rooms on the server at a time, so it could be hit or miss but we found a synchronous ‘chat’ also encouraged wider participation than in the classroom but less quality than on the discussion board.
Either way, of course the only real motivation for the extroverts as well as the introverts to post quality comments was a grade. So, I’d like to see Twitter and Facebook (or maybe a third party) have a public review system as I see on Amazon for product reviews — 👍 if this was helpful and 👎 if this was not helpful. Similar also to Seller Reviews, but Tweeter Reviews. Sellers will often bend over backwards to make sure you give them a favorable review. Tweeter Reviews would weed out the abusive people because you could sort on the positively reviewed and block all the rest. Let me know if something like this is already in place. I haven’t been involved in social media for awhile.
My post is too long now that I look at it. This is the first blog I’ve followed and I have some questions. It’s strange for me to talk about someone like they’re not in the room. Is it ok to refer to the blog author as he/she? If you’ve read something about the author outside the blog, is it polite to copy/paste it in their blog comments?
I googled how to be a good commenter but it all seemed to be related to making money blogging. I just want to know what’s polite and adds value. Do you have a link to good information?
As someone who deals with PTSD and Anxiety issues, plus being a single Dad. I just want to come out and say, you are inspiration to me, and the world is better for it. If you did, one day, step away from social media, you would still be the epic guy you are. Thank you for reaching out to us strangers, and allowing us to hear and read a little bit of your life, because it makes ours better. Thank you, Mr Wheaton.
#LLAP
Thank you, Wil, for all that you are and all you’ve given to the world. Live Long and Prosper with your beautiful wife and sons.
Thank you for writing what you do. You have inspired me to be a better person. It’s taken me a little while, but I have finally given up alcohol as well and am feeling a lot better about myself now. Keep up the good work and the good & honest writing!
That was really touching and beautiful, Wil. Your kids, and yes they are YOUR kids, and your wife’s of course, and don’t let any fsckers tell you otherwise. It hurts my soul to see someone like you get so much awfulness on Twitter, and if you ever decide to ditch it I know that I and everyone who love you would understand. I myself just ditched Facebook after going through an awful time in my life and getting almost zero support with a few exceptions. I just couldn’t handle being in a place that made me feel like I was back in goddamned high school, which made me feel like something I know I am not: a jerk, or an asshole, or in my (and your case) someone sick with mental illness/neurodivergence that was to be avoided. I had a day that sent me to a black room with no doors or windows and only the pinprick of light of my husband to show me there would eventually be a way out, and when the black walls pulled away to a more friendly gray, I made my last FB post. I’m not abandoning my blog, though, fuck that. And I’m going to write it no matter how few or how many people read it because really, it’s mostly for me, but man do I want to share my life with people, just like you do. And neither one of us, especially you, deserves to have handfuls of shit thrown at them every time they use social media. I guess I’ll just join you and the other folks in the world who are still nice and compassionate and do our best to protect ourselves from people who seem bent on cruelty in its many forms. I still post on Twitter, not that anyone notices, but hey, that’s cool. But no, I can’t read it for the most part. It’s a firehose of sewage just like Facebook, and if you’re curious you can always step over to my blog and see how trying to really engage with FB nearly drove me mad. It’s all good now, I’m going to stick to nice safe places like your blog, and look forward to every post. You’re a great guy, Wil, never forget that, and YOUR kids are very lucky. 🙂
The very personal story you told, and the very moving way you told it, really got to me. Hang on to your SAG card, by all means, but you, sir, are one a helluva writer.
Adulting is hard. But I think you’re getting the hang of it. That was a beautiful, moving story. And your insights into the state of Twitter are, I think, broadly shared.
Hi there,
Thank you for sharing!! I feel the same way about Facebook & Twitter, there are parts of social media that become not about sharing or communicating but showing how better one is, shoving your agenda down everyones’ throat and creating divisions. I however have friends and family who are still hooked to it and it seems to be the only way that I can know what is going on in their lives.
I love Instagram, I love the poetry of the image saying more than a thousand words and I follow you there because your images create a positive vibe in my media-verse!! I hope that you keep posting there and that it brings you joy!!
I’m an only child, my parents died when I was 19 & 27 respectively and if I lived by my Irish family’s standards, I would have no family except the man I married. Because blood is more important and even then siblings come over cousins, etc. My husband’s family are his family, my friends are just aquaintances and those cousins who judge me, they keep me at a distance. I can’t live like that, I can’t hope that I can have children sometime in the future and that will make an immediate & close family again for me. So I have created my family in my heart, I have adopted those who are closest to me and I don’t care a damn what anyone thinks. However, I never had anyone aggressively trying to undo my family like you. I applaud you for your perserverence and patience in creating and maintaining your family, thank you for letting your readers know this personal chapter
Thanks again for this and all your posts, please keep writing, blogging & acting. As U2 say, “Don’t let the bastards grind you down”
Anna
Agreed on your social media perspective. The persons who Tweet worthwhile messages are too few. Facebook is my personal social media crackpipe and I’m ready to kick it.
It’s been a pleasure and a comfort reading your words, watching you grow as a writer and artist, and so helpful as a person struggling with a similarly broken brain. Your writing on depression has helped me and my husband so much. We are grateful for what you’ve brought into the world. Thank you for sharing your struggles and triumphs with us. The beauty of the internet is that it can really bring people together if the interaction is approached with the right energy. You have consistently cultivated your “best self” as Mr. Rogers would say.
You don’t know me from a hole in the wall, but your piece resonated deeply with this former stepkid and stepmother. Good for you for being on your kids’ side, no matter what. Congrats–you made me cry. In a good way.
Thank you for opening your heart and sharing your soul in your writing. You touch more life than you know.
Mr. Wheaton, I envy you.
Wil- I have been a long time fan and only recently discovered your blog. Your writing brings such joy to myself and to so many and your tweets are one of the best parts about Twitter. With that being said, I agree that it has become a place more increasingly that people lose all sense of decency in how they respond and speak to one another.
Speaking to this post though, I read it with tears streaming down my face. My stepson came into my life at the age of two and is now 18. His mother has tried every tactic imaginable over the years to turn him against his father and I. Now that he has reached adulthood we believed it would be easier in some ways dealing with her (it isn’t).
All these years later he never hesitates in calling me Mom and has told me many times over how he chose me to be his Mom when he was little and he’s so glad he did. He is pursuing a career now and living thousands of miles away, but still texts every day. I often have to realize that I am a step parent because I have never felt any different that he is my child. Thank you for sharing your story, your boys are very lucky to have you in their lives!
Thanks for being yourself whenever and wherever you can. It’s light the world needs.
Wil,
Thank you for your wise words. Twitter is broken and the mob mentality has degraded my view of the world. You and Anne tell wonderful stories and thanks for sharing good in the world. I hope, whatever that you are going through, passes swiftly and with ease.
Wil, that was a beautiful story and I appreciate you taking the time to post it. I enjoy hearing about your life and I follow you on Twitter but it’s not worth it if it’s making your life more unhappy and stressful. I’ll read whatever you want to share, wherever you want to share it. I just enjoy reading about you and your family coz they’re interesting. Do what you need to keep yourself content. That’s more important.
Thank you for sharing whatever you choose to share – you are posting good, human things and it’s valuable. The fact that you post candidly about writing, about depression, about what it is to be online when so much of the Internet is a trash fire screaming for our outrage – it matters. It’s important. Thank you.
Interestingly enough, I just tagged you in a tweet. Last night my husband and I pulled out our VHS version of Stand By Me and had our 12 year old twins watch it. So many memories rushed through me as I sad there! My brother had been killed in 1989 in a car accident and my husband (who at the time resembled John Cusack significantly) started dating soon after. That VHS tape was one of my first gifts from him. What a treasured gift that movie is to me, then and now! I remember reading the Stephen King book before the movie came out. I was an avid King fan. I loved the movie. It’s still strange to me how pertinent the story line became in my life. I grew up in the 70’s with a group of three others and easily could have participated in similar antics. Thank you again for creating such a memorable roll.
I hear you. I hope the day comes you feel safe sharing your good stories. Your work and vulnerability has meant a great deal in my life. Good changes have started with your words.
Wil, you are a gentleman, and my life is richer for the things you have chosen to share.
Should you stop posting on Twitter, or elsewhere (or everywhere), I would respect that and still be grateful for everything you’ve done every time I watch my kids play board games I bought because of you, every time I work at supporting my wife with her struggles with her mental health and think of what I’ve learned from you, every time I’ve laughed and felt better about life because of- well, you get the picture.
You’re a good guy and I salute you, sir. You must do what is best for you and your family.
Wil,
Good post.
Consider hiring a digital assistant to manage your social media. That way you aren’t front and center, the DA can post updates on your behalf, and the DA can filter the signal from the noise and relay the messages from the people you want to hear from on Twitter.
May be expensive, maybe not. Never tried it. But I’ve heard some people do it and it helped big time with keeping sanity.
LLAP,
A Friend
Wil, your sons are very lucky to have you as a father. The bond you’ve forged seems very deep, and deeper than usual both for biological and adopted parents.
I understand the reasons that keep you on Twitter, but if some part of you just wants to quit, then maybe you should not let yourself be burdened by other people’s expectations. Wellington famously said, the hardest thing of all for a soldier is to retreat. The key is to realize that a retreat is not always a defeat. Sometimes it’s the best course of action that allows you to salvage more of your strength and regenerate your forces than a dogged, but forlorn defense. For those that want to keep in touch with you, there are other ways than Twitter to do that. Those that are true to you will adapt, those that aren’t won’t be a big loss to you. Who knows, I wouldn’t be surprised if a few other people followed your example.
Wil, thank you.
Hi, Wil. I was a reluctant adopter of Twitter to begin with, and I don’t spend much time there. I send up my blog posts to it, and occasionally tell our elected official just what I think of their actions — good or bad. I sometimes connect with fellow authors for whom I don’t have e-mail or FB connections.
But, like you, it’s off my phone and notifications are silenced.
I appreciate the honesty and forthrightness you have demonstrated in your blog. You may never know how many people your words have helped, across a variety of issues. I have wept countless tears after reading one of your articles on mental health as the words “someone understands what I’m going through” resonated throughout my head.
BTW, I’m a stepmother. My stepson is now in his 30s, but it is amongst my greatest honors that, given the choice to call me by my name or something else that would feel more comfortable, after the first couple of years of being “Sharon,” I became “Mom.”
Thank you so much for another heartfelt moment. Your blog is your safe place, a place to be you, be creative, be present. Use it as you will. And yes, Twitter is very broken. I have a cursory presence there, but I’ve been thinking about turning everything off there. I don’t like it either.
PS, I’m looking forward to your book, so keep writing. I actually read your other book, the memoir you wrote, and loved it. I bought it online, and for some stupid postal reason, it was very late to get to me. It actually got sent back to you! And you wrote a very sweet and personal note to me when you sent it to me for good. It always meant a lot to me that you cared enough for that. I’ll never forget it.
I’ve been on Twitter for almost 11 years now, and you’re right, it’s not fun anymore. While I haven’t quit, I rarely go there, and when I do, it’s not for long. And the big thing is, I don’t even care. I miss the fun days of social media…
Love this. I am so glad that you have such a good family. Thanks for sharing that story. As I said to Anne the other day at DCC, you make a difference in people’s lives and I, for one, greatly appreciate you.
If you need twitter to do what you are doing, then so be it. Just make sure you don’t get hurt in the process (I know, easier said than done).
My husband and I have three wonderful kids. I felt them grow inside me and I gave birth to them but that’s not what makes them mine. Neither does watching them come into this world and sharing a part of their DNA make them their father’s.
What makes them OUR kids is holding them when they cry, sharing their triumphs and comforting them in their defeats. Laughing and crying, fighting and making up, sharing precious time and memories, watching them grow up into wonderful human beings and standing amazed at what they become – that is what makes us a family. I don’t see where DNA comes into this and I am so very happy for you that you have a wonderful, loving family of your own.
Take care.
” I have a lot of deeply personal things happening in my life right now, that I have no intention of talking about. ”
I hope it works out in the best way possible.
Agree 100%. My husband of 24 years, who happens to be the second best father ever!, is really the only father our son has ever known and I’m eternally grateful. We were fortunate to have avoided the back and forth on weekends, the undermining, the bad-mouthing, courts and lawyers. . . and worse I’m sure. Thank God the bio father wasn’t in the picture.
Any two yahoos can conceive a baby but it doesn’t make you parents. Believe me. I have sat in group therapy/meetings many, many times where people are in pain in a myriad of ways from things their bio parent(s) did or didn’t do for them. I’m certainly not saying all step parents are angels by any stretch of the imagination, but I’ve seen that sharing DNA with someone doesn’t guarantee a loving, caring relationship. (Have you ever seen the movie MercyMe?)
I get not wanting to dum so much energy into twitter and blogging. I gave up on twitter years ago. So I get it. But I hope this doesn’t mean you’ll stop writing here. So much of what you’ve shared here has made a HUGE difference for me. Even if you cut back, please don’t go away.
Huge respect for you and your kids, and if I could, I would delete all my social media, and just run a blog for the family and friends. I barely update them now as it is, most of my updates are others tagging me.
You realize that you are saying that you want to be as genuinely you as possible while at the same time, you can’t be because there are people out there who want to know what you are up to. Be you and if people want to know what’s happening, they will find you. Build it, and they will come.
Dear Will,
I just wanted to say that as a previous step-kid, I would have loved to have felt accepted by my step-father, like your sons do by you. Only I … never did. Growing up I knew that I was the additional baggage and that I was not welcomed at his family reunions. Report cards went unlocked at and kind words were not shared.
Anyway I just wanted to say how I truly admire your ability to welcome your sons into your life like you did. I hope they know what a rare gift that is.
Thank you for sharing your life, your struggles, your joys. Talking about mental illness has given me more of an understanding of what my mom struggled with. And what my siblings can struggle with.
But your words about being a Step-Parent rang so true. My parents split up when I was 12, step-mother#1 was not a nice person. She thought having 2 sons would negate her 4 step-kids. Wrong. Step-mother #2 was nuts. Girl Friend (sort of step mother #3) is decent. But my step-dad – horse of a different color.
We called him our “Daily Dad” because that was what he was. He taught us to drive, picked us up from college, lent us money or advise, married our mom, taught us how to be quieter activists than mom.
He never tried to take over from my Dad, in fact the 2 of them had a good relationship. My step-dad had lost 2 kids to a house fire years ago and then his wife. He and my mom waited to marry so all of us could get thru college and not mess up our financial aid (he was not paying for college, that was on us).
But he was there for graduations, weddings and babies. He did not want to adopt, he thought that was rude to do to my dad, but he WAS my dad in every sense. So thank you for loving your boys and your wife. And reminding me of the wonderful human my step-dad was.
Walk away from Twitter. It does you no good, only harm. Please keep blogging – we love your writing and stories.
I’ve been reading your blog for a long time and noticed that at some point you transitioned from call those kids “step-sons” to “sons” and thought that was great. It’s wonderful of you to share that rather dramatic transition point with Ryan.
Wil, I love your blog and posts and your thoughts. It’s been so valuable to me to read what you share — it’s given me insight into my own life, helped me recognize the deep anxiety I lived with for 60 years, plus you’ve made me laugh and cry! You’ve been a gift. Thank you.