A Thank You To My Fiancé

I wouldn't be doing what I love each and every day if it wasn't for my fiancé.

Stefen Rosner

The Elmonters

, and

David Kolb

Jul 14, 2025

On Friday, my best friend in the whole wide world said yes!

Like any big-life moment, I spent the weekend reflecting on how we got to this point—a point eight years in the making.

While I owe my career to all of you for your continuous support day in and day out, it was Alyssa who got me started on this path, supporting me and my passion from the very beginning.

It was sometime in January of 2018. We were watching an Islanders game, as we routinely did. I had already started to write or blog, but I actually—yeah, you aren’t going to believe this—wasn’t on Twitter.

I knew nothing about the bird app. But Alyssa did.

She told me that if I wanted to achieve success, it seemed like all the sportspeople were on that app, and I should really consider having one.

That night, because I’m sometimes technology inept, Alyssa helped me set up an account. She taught me how to fire off a tweet, what a hashtag was, how to use the “@” symbol, and all the fun features Twitter had to offer.

That was the real start of my journey to getting to this point—a journey Alyssa kickstarted.

Now, to sit here and say that the path was easy would be the understatement of the century. My fiancé has made many sacrifices.

From the late nights, to me always on the move, to date nights cancelled because of breaking news—it isn’t the easiest profession on a partner.

I remember we had a date night planned, going out for a fancy dinner. I said we should be good as long as no news breaks.

Well, that was the night Lane Lambert was let go.

We were driving to get ice cream when the Islanders made the blockbuster trade for Bo Horvat. We were walking out the door for a July 4th party when the Islanders signed Scott Mayfield, Pierre Engvall, Semyon Varlamov, and Ilya Sorokin to longer-term extensions.

It happens a lot more often than you’d think. That’s the job—always being on the clock.

Alyssa understands how the industry works. That doesn’t mean it’s been easy to navigate—anything but.

What I think allowed her not to get frustrated, or at least not show frustration, was that she could see my love for my passion. And even if it was hard on her, she never let me give up on chasing it.

Every day, when I get up, sit down at my desk, and fire up the laptop, I’m reminded of how easy it would’ve been to give up. There were a lot of nights when I felt like I had tried everything to break through, and the mental strain on myself—and on her—wasn’t worth it.

Throwing in the towel would have been easy. Alyssa just never let me do that.

And I thank her every day for that—because I get to live out my dream each and every day, simply because she believes in me.

When you have a partner like that, you know you’ve made it.