My Existential Dread is Acting Up Today
August 29 2026
I don’t know what it is, but I’ve always had this feeling of needing to create something. It’s always felt necessary to me. Not creating leaves me with this pit in my soul that’s so difficult to fill with anything else but it.
In 2013, I was freshly off of writing articles and semi-viral Facebook posts for a site called the Pokemon Dungeon (RIP). We spent long days in calls going through all of Pokemon X & Y, marking down every trainer, every encounter, every item, everything. We were nowhere near as quick as Joe Merrick on Serebii or the folks over at Bulbapedia, but we tried! After awhile, the webmaster was worried the site wasn’t getting enough traffic. I pitched writing about my passion, competitive Pokemon. I watched tons of YouTubers like Haydunn and Shofu battle, I figured I could do it too. I wrote a guide to breeding Pokemon for perfect IVs. It went viral. Thousands of comments, tens of thousands of views in the first couple of days. The webmaster asked me to build on that momentum and gave me access to their Facebook page. I did giveaways of perfectly bred Pokemon, ran polls, and posted memes. We gained thousands of followers. At 16, I was proud of how much people loved what I did. So many eyeballs, so many comments, so many people. I never wanted it to stop. But of course, as with most viral moments, things died down. My posts weren’t getting many views, the motivation for the team to keep writing dwindled, and I was left with just a few other writers to build the site back up.
March 15th, 2014, my senior year of high school. I got into a Skype call with some friends and said, “What if we just did this ourselves? I think we could.” We wanted to make a place where people could talk about nerdy things. We wanted a space where anyone could see the gates open and walk in. Pop culture, video games, all of it meant the world to me. I wanted to share that passion with the world. I spent the day and made a website. I hopped into Photoshop and made a logo. Created a Facebook page, Twitter account, Twitch channel, YouTube channel, Instagram account. We called it, UzerFriendly.
The first few years of the site went off with a bang. We had lots of people writing about movies, music, tv shows, anime, video games – anything you could think of. Thousands upon thousands of views each day. Hundreds of comments. We made Let’s Plays on YouTube (with no success), did livestreams on Twitch (with a little bit of success), and multiple articles a day. We were on top of the world. I was on top of the world. Something that I built was….a success. We had a handful of sponsorships and partnerships, did coverage for a few conventions including NYCC, Rhode Island Comic Con, and PAX East. At 18, I was a content creator.
Not all stories end well though. There was a huge falling out within the organization. Everyone left. I was left with dozens of resignations and messages telling me that I wasn’t good enough. No one wanted to do the work because they didn’t believe in the vision nor in me. It was one of the most devastating moments in my life and something that I carry in my heart every day.
We rebuilt! We got new people together and kept creating. More streams, more videos, less articles. We focused on community building. Pushed more people to join our Discord community, had a myriad of events for people to hang out in, and streamed twice a week, every week. Once again, we were seeing success. I was seeing success. I was invited to stream for Black History Month on Twitch, got to have coaching sessions with larger streamers, and was assigned a contact to reach out to for support and assistance at Twitch. We were in double digit views for every stream. We hosted multiple charity events and raised over $1,000 for 2 separate charities. I loved every second of it.
Things didn’t end well. Another falling out. I deserved it. I didn’t handle myself well. Everything imploded and I was met with death threats and nasty DMs. A moment I will never forget. At the end of the day, I feel I did the right thing and don’t regret it. It’s been years since then. I’ve dipped my toes back into creating and streaming every so often. Every time, I feel incredible. Even with a small amount of people watching, it makes my heart soar. I just want to make things and have those things be appreciated. I want people to feel my passion. I cannot overstate how much I love the things that have made me….me. My friends. Pokemon. Video games. Everything. The amount of love and passion I have is overflowing and I need to channel it somewhere.
Where does that leave me now? I don’t know. I love this blog. I love the people I’ve made friends with recently. Online and offline. I love how things have changed for the better. Somedays, I look back and think I could’ve done things differently. I see some of my friends succeeding in content creation and think….that could’ve also been me. I could be one of the people flown out to Pokemon Worlds, could be one of the people personally invited to NYCC, could be on a billboard in Time Square (I really am proud of my BHM Twitch team, y’all rock). But I’m not. And it feels dishonest to say that it wasn’t my choice. Every Thursday, I get on a call with my friends to catch up. Every Sunday, I play Final Fantasy 14 with the gays. Usually on Tuesdays or Wednesdays, I’m playing Slay the Spire 2 with the “dads”. Fridays are date night with my incredible fiance (I’M GETTING MARRIED!!!). These people in my life, they feel my passion and appreciate it. They give me more than any number on Twitch or YouTube could. They listen to me, support me, and feel me. And it’s all I’ve ever wanted. The feeling of love I have for everyone returned to me tenfold. I may never go back to being in the public eye. But….I think that’s okay.
If I were to tell myself 12 years ago how far I’ve come – all the cool things I got to do, places I got to see, people I got to meet…..that in the end, everything will be okay. I don’t know if I’d believe it. I still don’t. But I’m going to keep working on being me and doing the best that I can to support everyone around me and pour that love and passion into everything I do and everyone I meet. It’s all I’ve ever wanted.
