Stella Reddy's Story of Hope

Good Morning from Newfoundland & Labrador (NL)!!

It is going to be a wonderful day here, with lots of Sunshine!! Going up to 21 degrees Celcius! I am excited to see what adventures I will have on this glorious day!

Doesn’t St. John’s Harbour look so amazing with the sun burning off the fog? The picture above is a screenshot I just took from NTV Skycams just now… I love the colours of this City! They brighten my day, even in cloudy weather.

I thought this picture would be fantastic with this post, as I was tagged by Linda, of The Mindful Migraine who lives on the other side of the World from me in Australia for this blogging challenge. This is my Happy Place and I wanted to share it with this post.

I found Linda’s Blog when she first came online a few months ago, as her writing caught my eye. She is so open and speaks from her heart, and it spoke to me. Anyone can relate to her posts… Besides, Linda is so much fun!! I can’t help but smile over some of her comments.

I am in Awe of Linda, to be honest. Her resilience, sense of humour, outlook, and interest in learning new things are what draw me to her posts! I hope you check out her Blog as I am sure you will find something of interest!

Now, to the blogging challenge I was given. There are 6 questions below that I was tasked to answer so I hope you enjoy my responses and that it will help you to understand me, and my Blog, a bit more.

How did you come up with your blog name?

I have been cyberbullied since the fall of 2017 on various websites created for that purpose over a workplace issue in an apartment building in Scarborough Ontario. We evicted these tenants for breaking the rules and they created this smear campaign in my name as a result, trying to sic people after me by accusing me of false allegations of racism, which is such a touchy subject in recent years.

I quit my job in the summer of 2018 so they created stellareddy.com in April 2019 to make it more personal against me. At the height of their smear campaign from 2017-2022 they had 7 domains online that contained my name, even adding a new one since I moved trying to get the people of NL against me.

I became a victim of fraud because of their actions online in 2020 and it took me months to fix everything.

My Blog name is in my personal name and I did it specifically to protect myself in April 2021. I had to do something to stop my name from showing up for various services provided online, and off, including LinkedIn, Jetpack, and SEOs, using my name with their domain stellareddy.com. I had people applying for credit cards in Ontario based on the info they shared online, even my Tax Account with Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) was hacked. I signed up with Protection Services and changed all my passwords because of their actions and spent months emailing companies letting them know it wasn’t me, it was fraud. When I created this site, it all stopped.

Over time, as I learned about cyberbullying, smear campaigns, narcissism and toxic traits, I became less reactive to their taunts online and my interests started to change to more hopeful and positive endeavours that helped me feel good. This is where I am today.

If your blog was a person (fiction or real), who would it be?

Fictional, and the only character that comes to mind is Bumblebee from Transformers…Yes, I love those movies and Bubblebee in particular. He is the strong, shy, and silent type, who lost his voice and uses the radio to speak. Once he gets his own voice though, look out! His personality blossomed and he came out strong!

I felt like that for many years, that I had lost my voice as whenever I spoke during the early days of this mess in 2017-2018 it felt like no one could understand me, as sometimes happened with Bumblebee with his radio. Once I moved away from Ontario and started to heal my mental health, I regained my voice and was being heard and understood, once again. Once I started clearing my head I was able to make more sense of what was going on.

What helps you create new content if you feel like you need some inspiration?

I get inspiration from other bloggers, Mother Nature, pins on Pinterest, and other social media, including YouTube, and psychology articles. I also write about myself and my thoughts, trying to make sense of this World. I have learned so much in recent years and willingly go looking for more to learn.

I still use some of the content written about me on stellareddy.com though not as often as I did. Thankfully, that is the only site with content, and even that is incomplete. I doubt very much they will post the rest of it…I am not angry anymore over what they do but sometimes I still get a little resentful that they won’t stop.

Is there anyone you would like to collaborate with?

There are so many awesome writers out there on WordPress but to be honest I would love to write something with my Dad. He is a published author with many books and short stories, including non-fiction. He is still writing, even though he retired many years ago…I felt honoured when he called me after reading some of my posts and gave me some advice a while back.

Is there anything more you wish you had or would like to learn as a blogger?

Yes, to stop being so slow and fussy over writing posts. I also wish that Plugins weren’t so expensive. There are some I really like to use but they cost so much…

Do you have a specific style of blogging?

Nope, I know I am all over the place, as it depends on how my body, and mind, feel and I share what I like. It takes me so long to write a post, been working on this one now for almost 3 hours… due to nerve pain in my left arm into my hand. I can’t type the 100 words per minute that I used to do…so posters sometimes are my best option to express myself. Short and sweet but to the point. I also tend to go back and re-read it a couple of times before I hit that “publish” button.

The End…

I hope you enjoyed reading some of my responses and learning more about me and why I started writing. This version of my Blog is not very old, my last one was causing me problems so I took it as a sign to start over, which I did a couple of months ago. The content now reflects where I am now in my healing journey. I no longer wanted my Blog to be about what was done to me, but rather about my growth and how I have moved past that mess.

Now on to the next part, tagging someone else! I didn’t reach out to these Bloggers first so I hope they don’t mind me tagging them! I also haven’t been following these Bloggers long but I think we need to see more of their posts being shared online, as I greatly appreciate them and know others would as well. I hope they decide to accept the challenge!

I would like to tag Sunshine over at Littlethings.

I have read this Blog for a while now and the insights I have found in their writing have helped me quite a bit with mental health. The About page states:  “Hi this is Madhumanti. Welcome to my page. I love everything about writing and has a degree in literature. Currently pursuing degree in psychology, I am planning to lend a supporting hand for personal development.” I hope you go check out the posts there and find some solace too.

Another person I would like to tag is Manisha nandan of nandasagec.

I haven’t been following this person very long but I love their posts!! They speak to me and I greatly appreciate their insights and I am sure you will find something of interest there as well.

I greatly enjoy reading posts made by people all over the World and I am honoured and appreciative that they take the time to read my posts as well.