A Love/Hate Relationship with Facebook

Long after most of my peers had already joined Facebook, I was still holding out. I was a busy mom, working long hours with a long commute, and I just couldn’t deal with another task. About three months into my second pregnancy, my doctor put me on bed rest due to various complications, and before long, I was a Facebook convert.

The honeymoon lasted about 2.6 seconds before I realized I had been right: Facebook was another chore to contend with, mostly because reading the constant stream of live updates in my news feed often left me feeling pretty rotten about myself.

When I first joined, I was on a reconnection high. Although I couldn’t remember why I had lost touch with so many “friends,” I was thrilled to “see” them again. The fact that years had passed, in most cases, was irrelevant. There were a number of people I was sorry to have lost contact with, and I found Facebook to be a useful tool in rebuilding old relationships.

And then reality set in.

Suddenly, I was wondering why my school-aged son wasn’t already a virtuoso pianist and hadn’t yet been trekking through Alaska on a brain-building mission. Why wasn’t my newborn daughter reading yet? Should we get a dog? And why didn’t I ever learn to crochet? I was repeatedly inundated with self-doubt in the form of Facebook posts. Punch after self-esteem-crushing punch, I willed myself to be happy for my Facebook friends. But most of the time, I just stared at the screen, thinking, “I must be an awful wife/mother/sister, [fill in the blank], because I didn’t do/buy/go to [fill in the blank].”

How could I possibly be and do all those things flooding my news feed on a daily basis?

Well, I couldn’t. It took some time, but eventually I realized that the problem wasn’t Facebook: it was me. Facebook only provided me with another medium in which to raise self-doubt and self-loathing, and succumb to peer pressure. (Yes, I will – sheepishly – admit, I tried to potty train my daughter before she was ready based on Facebook posts of moms with similar-aged kids. Not my finest moment.)

I was always the one to tell others, “Who cares what other people think or are doing?! Do what’s best for you.” I still live that way… except when I’m on Facebook.

It’s like that blue and white screen sucks me into another world filled with shining accomplishments, phenomenal vacations, perfect kids, and overall enviable lives. Could it all be for real? Was the rest of the non-Facebook world living this way?

I couldn’t be the only person with this question. In fact, I seem to remember someone writing on their Wall once, “Good morning, façade book.” Yup, there it was.Very few people (me, included) are willing to post how hard it is to manage a job, a house, and raise kids – it’s like all the messy bits of parenting somehow evaporate between posts of father-daughter dances and Disney vacations. Seriously? Parenting is so much more cluttered than that. I know, I know: who wants to read about the chaos when they’re living it? So, really, how much of Facebook is real?

I had pretty much decided to delete my account when I began noticing another trend that gave me pause: posts about a sick parent, a friend experiencing a difficult pregnancy, prayers for an ill child. I watched, somewhat amazed, at the outpouring of support from dozens of fellow Facebook users. I have been moved to tears at times by the words and deeds prompted by the posts shared by users having a difficult time. This use of the social media, to me, balanced out all the other stuff. And it was very real.

So, if I’m being honest, all that other stuff is just that: stuff. Just because someone went skydiving or took their child to swim with the dolphins doesn’t mean I have to do so, or even that I have to care.

Facebook is just one more lesson to us women (and us moms) that we have to rise above any superficial and materialistic tendencies to successfully navigate life’s messy bits. We have to force ourselves to focus on the important things, like supporting those who need us and making decisions based on what is best for us and for our families.

I have learned to love (and use) Facebook for the benefits it does bring – that additional medium of connectivity and support between old and new friends that might not exist without this social media. But once I turn off my computer, for my own and my family’s sanity, that world must be forgotten.

* This article originally appeared on The Mommy Vortex.