Social Media - good or bad?

After my suicide attempt, I deactivated my Facebook. I kept Instagram for a little while, but after a few months, I got rid of that also. I could see that social media was having a negative effect on my mental state so I had to get away from it. But Jerilyn, you have an Instagram page now connected to this blog. Good point.... however, I don't have access to the page because I don't want to get sucked back in. A wonderful friend of mine, Kate, runs my Instagram for me. I send her a picture and a caption and she posts it. She is my Social Media Manager - doesn't that sound legit? Haha. The reason I set up an Instagram for this page is to help my blog reach more people. When I created this website through WIX, they have tips to help you manage your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and it kept telling me every time I logged in to connect my blog to my social media so that I could reach more people.

For a while, I stubbornly thought "no! I'm not going to get back on social media because that was a contributing factor to my depression and anxiety in the first place." However, after thinking about it for a while, I decided to make an Instagram because the truth is, whether I like it or not, social media is huge right now and if I want my page to reach more people and possibility help others who might otherwise not find my blog, then I guess it is worth it. The only reason I caved is because Kate was willing to manage the page for me so that i won't fall back into some of my bad habits. I have a personality prone to anxiety and I have OCD tendencies and the last few months and years I was on social media really brought those things out in me. I didn't even want to give myself the chance to regress back to what I was like before.

Facebook first became popular when I was a sophomore in college. It seemed really cool and a fun way to connect with your friends and stay up to date on everyone's lives. That is the number one reason I hear when people say why they hang on to their Facebook even though they generally have a negative opinion about Facebook as a whole. How many people felt left out when they saw pictures that were posted from last weekend's party and you weren't there? How many times have you felt bad because your pictures didn't get a lot of "likes"? Have you ever seen someone listed as "active" on Facebook messenger, yet they aren't answering their phone or responding to texts so you think they're ignoring you? Do you know someone whose relationship was damaged or ended by their partner connecting with someone else? Has your Facebook ever showed you a memory from years past that brings up some negative/upsetting emotions? The list of questions could go on and on.

My sister was telling me the other week about a study she read that talked about anxiety levels in men and women. For years, they were actually almost the same and then in 2010 the anxiety levels in women skyrocketed. She asked me if I knew what happened in 2010 to which I responded "Instagram". I always liked Instagram better than Facebook just because when scrolling through the feed, I generally didn't have to see people's random thoughts and political ramblings and Insta felt more sophisticated. I found that on Insta, you could connect to basically any celebrity or influencer that you want, and that can tend to make you feel bad about yourself. You see how "perfect" they are and how fat, ugly, lazy, etc. you are. I used to also get down these rabbit holes where I'd be on one person's page, then it would lead me another, and another and another until the next thing I knew, I wasted over an hour. I spent so much time mindlessly scrolling - it was addicting!

I am so glad that social media was not around when i was in middle school and high school. I can't even imagine what issues kid's deal with being constantly connected (do I sound like an old lady yet?). Teenage years are already so tough as you try to navigate through figuring out who you really are. I can't imagine the negative effect that social media has on still developing brains. I think since social media is "newer" there aren't too many actual scientific studies and numbers out there but for me, the cons of social media absolutely outweighed the pros and for that reason, I got rid of it. What do you think about social media? Do you have any negative habits from it?

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