What Happened When I Cancelled My Home Internet — And Why I Never Resubscribed

At first, it felt worse than withdrawing from caffeine or nicotine. Worse than having a power outage. Worse than having no hot water and having to take an ice cold shower in the middle of January.

I cancelled it because it was expensive. Yeah, I know — they advertise cheap internet services for $40 a month, but then they add modem fees, taxes, random fees for all sorts of other things, and before you know it, it’s $80 a month.

But wait! If you sign up for the “double play” package and get cable TV with it, it’s only $100 a month for both!

No.

But wait! The competitor offers the same package for only $80! But wait. There’s a monopoly, so the competitor doesn’t serve your area.

At first, I did it because I had no choice. I needed to cut back on all unnecessary spending. But after the initial withdrawal period, I found myself perfectly content without having internet (or TV), and over a year later, I still haven’t resubscribed.

People like to gloat about how they cancelled their cable TV services and “survived” on Netflix, Prime Video, Hulu, and the like.

But without internet, you can’t have streaming services, so I went all out and eliminated all forms of…