I had to abandon an email address for similar reasons. I added a mailto link on my website and within weeks started to notice some spam. I then removed the mail

I had to abandon an email address for similar reasons. I added a mailto link on my website and within weeks started to notice some spam. I then removed the mailto link and replaced in the format of, "me [at] domain [dot] com" but it didn't help much. Eventually I created a new email address and just used that all high priority stuff that I needed to read. All was good for a while but then a couple of companies that have my email address got hacked and I guess my info must have been sold because since then I've started receiving spam emails again. It's manageable at the moment, but I wonder if there will again come a time that I have to start over with a new email address.