Stuck in Preparing backup for over an hour

WD External Drives External Drives for Mac
1

I have a WD Elements that I purchased at an Apple store for backing up my MacBook. I have used it once a couple of months ago and it worked fine.

However, I am trying to back up my computer today and it’s been stuck in “preparing backup” for over an hour.
I am so frustrated with the whole “external harddrive” issue. I’ve had 4 of them fail on me in the last year.