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Monday, September 7

The day that did me in

UPDATE: I got the pictures back! Read this for more info but the 'rice trick' worked on my poor phone and I managed to back it all up! Happy to have multiple copies saved now:) 
Thank you guys so much for all the suggestions and advice!!
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Today's picture-less post (for the first time ever on The Freckled Fox) is a PSA to everyone out there with a smart-phone that hasn't backed it up in a while: GO BACK IT UP RIGHT NOW!

Stop what you're doing, click away from this tab on your laptop or whatever, put down your cold pizza or cup of coffee and for goodness sake plug your phone in and back that $%*& up before it's too late. Do it:)

'Too late' for me was last week when my phone fell in the toilet and I lost E V E R Y T H I N G on it from the whole last year. I was okay losing my contacts and the texts, etc, and I was even okay losing my tons of notes that were filled with sentimental thoughts and journal entries, etc, but what I cried like a baby over was the 12,000 (read: 12 THOUSAND) plus pictures from August of last year up to now that are just totally gone. So heartbreaking.

Such a silly, stupid move to have not saved them. Especially since my phone was basically all we'd been using to take photos with since our life got so crazy:(

All those picture-worthy moments. All those happy memories that we could relive by flipping through those photos. Birthdays, Holidays, Martin's bodybuilding competition, date-nights, our life since he was diagnosed, our treatment trip to Mexico, family trips, sleepy mornings, all our home renovations pictures, lydia's crazy bedhead, all of Evie's home-birth photos and her whole life up till now basically. All gone. So heartbreaking:( 

I didn't cry right away. Not until I was behind the counter talking to the phone tech, who told me it was fried, that I shouldn't have tried to turn it back on for at least a week and that there was no hope. The tears started to come as I really thought about how preventable this all had been. About how the years with Martin may be vary few as it is and I'd basically flushed all of 2015 down the toilet (pun intended), and once they started I couldn't stop them.

Those poor girls were so sweet and comforting as I stood there crying and nodding with kids in my arms and at my feet, while they talked about discounts and such for a new phone. Two of them wrote down their cell numbers so I could text or call if I needed anything. One of them kept patting me on the back.haha

I cried while packing the kids in the car, while driving to the old house, while putting my dead phone in a bag of rice, and while driving back to the new house. Then I cried some more in the driveway when Martin came out and held me for a while.

So, have I painted a bleak enough picture for you yet? haha Don't be the girl bawling in Verizon!! Back up your photos and never ever let this sort of thing happen to you, if it hasn't already. (If so, I totally feel ya!) 

Flash forward to today, I have a shiny new phone and I've vowed to back it up at least a couple times a week at least. I also downloaded the free Flickr app (not sponsored:)) and set up the auto photo uploader, so all my pictures will be backed up in multiple places. I've also used and loved Photobucket (again, free and also not sponsored.haha) for years for transferring photos from my phone to my computer and vice versa. Just FYI:)

There will be many more happy days. More giggles, more trips, more birthdays, pillow fights, spaghetti faces, date nights, and crazy ginger bed-head, and if I'm lucky enough to catch any of it on camera than I can rest assured Ill have those photos forever.

No regrets in life, just lessons learned:) ...but if you have any words on your similar experience or any consolation, they'd be greatly appreciated! Haha 

Take care loves, 

P.s. We still don't have Internet at the new house, but now that I have my new phone I'll be able to post on social media again as well as share happier posts daily here on the blog. Hooray! 

51 comments:

  1. Oh honey I so feel your anguish and loss. Photos are so important. I hope and pray that they will be able to recover something from your phone, also that family and friend can email pictures they have. Am backing up as soon as I've posted this comment. FYI I also make it a habit to order a few hard copy photos of special events, just in case technology changes, so I have something to keep. Not gloating trying to be helpful. Sammie x www.feastingisfun.com

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  2. Aw, Emily, I'm so so sorry this happened to you :( I understand how you must be feeling but I think you're handling it really well. It's normal you felt so upset about it- it really was a lot of photos but the good thing is you still have all those memories...which is really all we have in the end.

    I signed up a few years ago for a photo storage website that had just started and it went out of business within 2 years and didn't give me a chance to save all my photos (3 years worth!) so I was of course feeling super frustrated about it. From now on, I'll be sticking with the established photo storage sites (yep, like Flickr and Photobucket)

    <3

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  3. Oh bless you hun, I feel for you. Just hold those memories in your heart and like you say it was a lesson learned. I'm in the middle of backing up everything on my computer xx
    art-love-fashion.blogspot.com.au

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  4. Ohh no!!! I can not imagine how this must feel!! It must be like a part of your life has been erased! Especially in your family's circumstances, this is so awful! Ahh I feel for you! Hoping for many happy family snaps to come!!
    Marga

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  5. Have Mercy!!!! I never thought about using an app to automatically transfer photos to another place. Ahhhhh, thank you! Goodness, I'm sad to hear your story....no shame in those tears. Hugs!!!! Lisa

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  6. Oh no :( I'm so sorry. A while back my MacBook broke and I lost all my photos from when my son was born in 2009 up until 2014.. I was and still am gutted x

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  7. Oh, no! I'm so sorry to read this. It's my worst nightmare. But I have been backing up my photos and videos automatically for a few years now. I use Google photos and DropBox. I also tend to email my photos to myself and keep them in a folder in my email account. I always tell people that they should back up but I don't think they listen. Hope this PSA helps people take it seriously. It's devastating.

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  8. I'm so sorry this happened :(! About 10 years ago I accidentally deleted about 500 photos from my mom's camera with my computer and she STILL to this day any time I use her camera or computer says "Don't delete anything." It kills me. Ugh.
    I hate this. I'm so sorry this happened.
    Since having our first baby- I have been using USBs to every now and then (when I remember) back up the photos to USB just in case of a computer catastrophe... But I'm working on getting better about the phone too.
    Shutterfly and Lulu have options for photo books that I LOVE. I go back and forth from both of them to create photo albums that I can print. That helps keep me motivated to have the photos saved and cataloged.
    Lots of hugs.

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  9. i totally had this happen with the photos o n my computer. many years ago. Because i had them on a memory card as well. well my house was robbed and the memory card was stolen and then my computer crashed two weeks later. i was so upset. 6 months later my best friend died and a bunch of pics of her and i were on that memory card and on my computer but had been lost. it totally sucks. i guess as long as i took a lesson from it thats okay. hang in there :)
    XO Ellen from Ask Away

    www.askawayblog.com

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  10. I learned this lesson the HARD way also. I lost pictures from our last few months in Washington all of our move to Florida, most of my son's 1st year. I ugly, ugly cried for a good hour or so.

    Now I have my phone automatically upload every single picture into Dropbox. It's amazing. I don't even have to think about it, and I can access the pictures from annnnnywhere. Some genius on IFTTT created the app and I am forever indebted to that brilliant beautiful soul.

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  11. Oh my goodness, that's terrible!!! I can't imagine losing all of that. I'm so sorry, Emily :(

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  12. Oh my Emily! That's just terrible! Dropbox is another good "cloud" type place that automatically uploads. You can store document files too. And hey, think of all the new memories! You'll have thousands of them in no time :)

    -Jenna
    Www.loveabibliophile.com

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  13. Totally understand and feel for you. I back up my phone with Amazon and Dropbox so when I ran out of space to take pictures and videos with out checking I deleted some videos about 18 of them relying on the fact "oh they are backed up". Later on that day I decided to look back at the videos and went into the back up applications when I realized BOTH were full and hadn't backed up in a few weeks...WEEKS. I started to hyperventilating and realize only the videos had not backup and guess what that is what I had deleted. I was sooooooo upset at myself for doing that. I had just deleted our family videos of our vacation and my daughters 1st day of Prek3. Lesson learned!!!!!
    I should have know because about 2 years ago I dropped my laptop but thankfully I had a backup service which saved all of my stuff. When I say all of my stuff I mean pictures from way before digital memory existed that were taken on floppy disk. I had a few hours of scare till I logged in and realized I was fully backup. What a relief.
    Hang in there and wishing you happy new and future backed up memories.

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  14. Last August I dropped my laptop and I hadn't recently backed it up. I did some serious crying over the loss of those pictures. My daughter had just started walking at 22 months after going through a regression. It was a major struggle to get her walking and I had several videos on there that I hadn't backed up. I was completely heartbroken over the loss of those videos. I felt silly crying over the videos and pictures, but they are memories. I definitely understand the heartbreak!

    +Becca
    ourbeautifulmessblog.com

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  15. Oh gosh, I'm so sorry! That sucks so bad. I'm sorry you lost them all :(

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  16. Hey Emily,

    So sorry to hear this, I know how frustrating this can be. Here is something to try...Put your phone in a sealed bowl with instant rice for two weeks. I dropped my phone in the sink and thought all was lost. I tried the above trick and it worked, I was able to get all of my pictures. The phone companies don't tell you this little trick because they want to sell you a new phone. Good Luck!!

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  17. I feel your pain. That has happened to me once, and I still feel my heart break when I think of those photos too ):
    Hope you feel a lil bit better today.

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  18. Oh Emily, I am SO sorry for you! I seriously started crying reading your post, I feel so bad for you. There were two times that my phone died (including one week ago) and I thought I had lost all of my photos from the last year including every single photo of my baby girl born in March and our other 2 children. I felt so sick to my stomach while I was waiting for my brother-in-law to try and get it to come back to life but held off the tears until I heard the final result. anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I am thinking of you, I am feeling sorry for you and can feel your pain at least a little. my sisters and I are praying for you Martin, and I will now pray that God will miraculously give your photos back to you. also I am not familiar with Flickr, but I started using one drive which gave me a free terabyte of space and will upload automatically and are stored online but are easily accessible from any computer or device. Hope you have a beautiful rest of the day. =).

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  19. Emily, I am so sorry that this happened to you! I recommend BackBlaze. It backs up everything on your computer, and I mean everything, unlimited space, or $5 a month. It's been a total lifesaver. It got me through a hard drive crash in college. I hope that you are feeling better today. I think of you often.

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  20. I am so sad that happened to you :( Last Thanksgiving I accidentally deleted all of the pictures off of my phone. I was only trying to get rid of one, but lost 400. My daughter's prom, 16th birthday, my son's soccer pictures and last family pictures of those who passed away. Sometimes you find some here and there, ones you emailed out or sent to someone via text (they can send a copy back to you). So, I understand how sad you feel. You have a beautiful life, and all those pictures that are gone are at least still happy memories that live on in your heart.

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  21. Ok not trying to give you too much false hope but my phone was soaked and I immediately tried turning it on once dry and I couldn't get it to turn on. Fast forward a few months and it worked again like it hadn't gotten wet at all. Just saying don't trash it yet if you haven't yet!

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  22. All my encouragements and understanding ! I just lost all my documents last week on my computer, including my lessons, notes, sheets, preciously conserved for my studies (I'm a medical student). It's a hard way to learn how to let go, but let's learn anyway (and remember the lesson !). Take heart, the memories are still with you !

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  23. I wouldn't give up just because a technician at the Verizon store couldn't help. If you still have the phone, search for hard drive/data recovery services. It will be costly and slow, but it's amazing what they can recover.

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    2. Yes, please try this!! My husband works in IT and said the folks at data recovery places can work wonders. Something similar happened to my brother - they had all family photos on a totaled laptop and were able to get them back.

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  24. Oh that is the worst! Sometimes it's the little things that can be the last straw.

    Alyssa
    www.feathersandstripes.com

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  25. I am so sorry you lost all the things that were on your phone that's awful! I'm going to back mine up today <3

    http://www.abigailalicex.com/

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  26. I feel your pain! That happened to me in 2010 and it was a lesson learned! I'm sorry for your loss, but happy you have a new phone 😉🌟💛

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  27. This is incredibly sad. I am so sorry. :( You're 100% sure that icloud, microsoft one drive or drop box weren't on your phone perhaps backing up behind the scenes right?

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  28. It might be hard to understand now but there may be a purpose to you losing those thing. There may be a reason behind it.
    I once accidentally deleted my online journal documenting my entire first pregnancy. It was unrecoverable and so very heartbreaking for me. But I could feel that it needed to happen for a reason that I didn't understand at the time. Now looking back it was a hard time in our marriage and I had recorded lots of fights that I never want to relive or let my children see. It was a blessing in disguise. Good luck!!

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  29. girl I know you feel!! Three years ago, our little family went on a roadtrip and we took our laptop with us. My littles were 6 and 3 at the time.. We stopped overnight and totally forgot to bring the laptop in! The next morning we went to pack up and saw that someone had broken in and taken our laptop. 6,000 pictures, and countless videos, including both births of our babies, birthdays, road trips .. you name it, were on there. I cant express how I felt .. it was a loss I couldnt describe. the fact that some idiot took our precious memories to pawn for a few bucks about did me in. We left to return home and I honestly felt like I was leaving part of me, like i was'nt supposed to leave. We filed a police report but to this day have never recovered it. I truly feel like I grieved those memories for a long time and worried about all the pictures I would forget I had ever had. I'm so so sorry. It's such an awful awful loss

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  30. Don't give up hope! A friend of ours dropped his phone in our pool over a year ago while trimming trees in the back yard. When we drained the pool to get it ready for the summer, we found it. I put it on the patio table and sent him a picture of it. He gave it to my daughter, as he figured it was toast. Being the teenager that she is, she put it on the charger and the darn thing turned on! It had sat in the sun for several hours, so I'm guessing it dried out. He was able to take it to AT&T to retrieve all his pictures and videos. This thing was submerged in icky pool water for a year! You might leave it in that bag of rice for a few weeks and give it a try! I have Verizon and am using their cloud as well as iCloud for my phone and iPad. I lost 82,000+ pictures on an external hard drive 3 months after my son died so I know the devastation in losing so many memories. I was fortunate and found someone who was able to retrieve all of my photos, so don't give up hope.

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  31. Don't give up hope! A friend of ours dropped his phone in our pool over a year ago while trimming trees in the back yard. When we drained the pool to get it ready for the summer, we found it. I put it on the patio table and sent him a picture of it. He gave it to my daughter, as he figured it was toast. Being the teenager that she is, she put it on the charger and the darn thing turned on! It had sat in the sun for several hours, so I'm guessing it dried out. He was able to take it to AT&T to retrieve all his pictures and videos. This thing was submerged in icky pool water for a year! You might leave it in that bag of rice for a few weeks and give it a try! I have Verizon and am using their cloud as well as iCloud for my phone and iPad. I lost 82,000+ pictures on an external hard drive 3 months after my son died so I know the devastation in losing so many memories. I was fortunate and found someone who was able to retrieve all of my photos, so don't give up hope.

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  32. Oh man, my heart breaks for you! But don't give up hope! Maybe after sitting in rice for a while it will have a miracle recovery--phones do weird things.

    I used to be terrible about backing up photos and now I try to religiously back them up so if anything ever happens to my phone, I'll still have all those memories.

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  33. Same thing happen to me! My heart was broken! I had tons of family pictures vacations!! My kids pictures with missing teeth!! Ugly sweater day at school...ect... I couldn't accept the fact that they were all gone. But it does get better I have defenetly learned my lesson.

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  34. Hey Emily! I am so sorry this happened to you and I can totally relate. Do you remember how I had just gotten my new iPhone right before we roomed together for BlogHer? Well 3 weeks after I got married, I accidentally washed is in the washer for only 3 minutes and that was enough. I lost everything from Conference, my Bachlorette party, my wedding, buying our house, mine and my husbands honeymoon and so much more! I cried just as hard as you did. I couldn't believe I had lost them all! I am sorry this has happened! I am glad you try to think of the bright side through all of this! You are amazing!

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  35. I dropped my phone once in the toilet while I was at work. I didn't have rice there obviously, so I took our the battery and put it in direct sunlight for about 10 minutes. Our totally worked with my Samsung Galaxy so I was glad that didn't ruin my pictures. However, recently I accidently hit delete all while trying to clear up my Instagram outfit pics. I had about 900 pictures and was devastated. I tried everything to restore them but no luck. I lost a lot of good vacation pics from a few years ago that I don't have on instagram so I totally feel type pain.

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  36. Thank you for the reminder! I just backed my phone up. I don't do it nearly enough!

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  37. I'm sorry - I know how upsetting it is. When I first adopted my dog I took a ton of photos that first month. Shortly after that, my memory card stopped being read. It had the photos on it, it just can't be read. Anyway, I've come to terms with it. But also, I know how saddening it is.

    Also, it is great to know that if that happens to any of us too, that we should wait a week to try turning on the phone (after it's been sitting in a bucket of white rice, right? All the tips!)

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  38. Oh dear, I feel for you so much. My photos automatically go to my computer as soon as they are taken. But I do need to have another back up plan for the years of photo on my desktop computer.

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  39. Emily!!!!! I dropped my iPhone in the toilet once... I put it in a bowl covered with uncooked rice for 2 days! It sounds stupid and crazy but it started working again!! Please try!!! I know how awful it is to lose all the pictures...... I hope it will work for you as well! Sending you my love. 😘

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  40. This almost happened to me when my phone fell in the toilet a few months ago! Thankfully it was safe. My computer completely shut down last month, though and I had to reset it to the factory setting losing hundreds of photos, documents and other things that were important to me. I was so heartbroken over it! I need to save everything to dropbox from now on!

    Morgan - theradwife.blogspot.com

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  41. I'm sure you've tried and heard every piece of advice, but use a blow dryer NOW! Pull that phone out of rice and use a blow dryer on it. It worked for me. I dropped my phone in a sink of water and submerged it for a full 30 seconds. The techs at Verizon and the Apple store told me nothing could be done. Luckily I have a teenage boy who KNOWS EVERYTHING. He told me to use the blow dryer on it. Sure enough, it worked and everything was saved!

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  42. Hi Emily,
    My heart goes out to you because this happened to me about 6 months ago and it was devastating. I'm a professional photographer and had client images on my hard drive that I desperately needed, not to mention all of my personal precious pictures. A tech guy tried to recover, but had no luck so he suggested I send it off to a company called Drive Savers. I am in no way affiliated with this company, I just feel it is my duty to share because they totally saved all of my stuff! They claim they can recover 99% of cases whether it be a hard drive, computer, or phone. It was super pricey... I think I paid $2000 (I know, ridiculous) but I had no choice but to pay it because I had client work on my external hard drive. Anyways, if you're desperate and willing to pay... give them a call! They will give you a quote. Their customer service is incredible.

    http://www.yelp.com/biz/drivesavers-data-recovery-novato

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  43. Ahhhh this is the worst! I've totally done something like this by the way. I used to be terrible at backing up photos. Now with the cloud, I seem to feel a little more at ease. Also, I had no idea you could buy an external hard drive that can automatically import photos from your phone! I was shocked when I learned that. Hang in there, girl. <3

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  44. That happened to me before Apple introduced iCloud. It was TERRIBLE. I'm still haunted by it 4 years later!

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  45. Have you tried the DropBox App with its secondary app Carousel? You can then link it to your desktop so you have easy access to your photos no matter where you write your posts, and on top of that I just also dropped my phone in the toilet last week, and after getting a replacement all I had to do was re-download the app and all my photos were still there and readily available! You can also sync it across multiple devices, so we have it on our desktops, laptops, tablets, and cell phones... Just a thought.

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  46. If it's really important to get the photos back, look into Drive Savers. They're the best in the industry for retrieving data.

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  47. I've unfortunately been there, except instead of photos, my external hard drive was stolen and I lost all of my writing work I did in college (and I was an English major...so there was a lot). That was pretty heartbreaking as well.

    Also, I recently just read your post on your husband being diagnosed with melanoma in April. I come to your website all the time to check out the hairstyles you post (which are all so incredibly lovely, by the way), but I had never read this particular blog entry about your husband. My best friend in the whole world passed away two years ago from the exact same thing, also without any melanoma spots on her skin, showing that she didn't get it from UV rays. Her father passed away from the same thing. It was already invading her spine and hips when she was diagnosed. And when I read your blog about your husband, my heart ached so badly for you. Losing my best friend through a two year long battle with melanoma was one of the hardest things I've ever had to go through, but I learned so much from the experience. She was full of hope and optimism the whole time, and even though I would much rather still have her here with me, the things she taught me as she left this world in such a hard way are things I will cherish forever. Of course every situation is different, but please know that I am praying for you and your family, for happiness and the health of your husband.

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  48. So sorry to hear that! Since june this year I've got instant dropbox backup (not sponsored ;)). Just in case!
    xx
    Mila
    http://milaslittlethings.com/

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