I use VPNs only a few times per year, hence why I’m not subscribed to any of them. But I had possibly the worst luck ever trying to use them, and at this point I’d rather just spend my time trying to not go through this nonsense.

I wanted to access a piece of content with a VPN. I won’t go into detail because that’s unimportant here. This is all the nonsense I went through before giving up.

1. Windows laptop, Proton VPN. I’d used this before successfully months ago, so I tried again. It. Just. Could. Not. Connect. I was left hanging for minutes on end.

2. Okay, let’s try on my Android phone. Still Proton VPN, same account. Was able to connect, but even though the server was nearby and at 54% load, NOTHING would load, not even an innocuous DDG search. I tried switching from WiFi to mobile data, and that did not help.

3. I have a backup VPN for cases like this, Tunnelbear. I know this isn’t the highest quality VPN but it’s served me well several years ago when Proton was overloaded. It also just could not connect, saying that my private DNS settings were bad. I switched from WiFi to mobile data, and still got the same error.

4. Now exasperated, I tried using the Mozilla VPN on my Linux desktop. After setting up a new account and going through the motions, I tried to connect and just got an error, with it slyly suggesting to try in a few minutes.

5. Tried Proton VPN on my phone one last time, and now it could not connect at all.

I then proceeded to give up and use a credit-card free trial to access the content. The entire process including cancelling the subscription took about 30 seconds. Trying – and failing – to troubleshoot the VPNs took more like 30 minutes.

Am I experiencing this trouble because I am trying to avoid paying for VPNs, or is it always this bad?

Edit: It turned out that the content wasn’t what I actually needed and the paid site didn’t have it. I ultimately caved and paid for a month of Mullvad VPN to get the singular piece of content, and it just worked. Maybe you can give me some ideas on what to do with my newfound power while it lasts.