As much as I love my social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter) to keep up with what my friends and family are up to it can also be a source of pain when you find out about life changing experiences or events through these platforms as opposed to from your friends! Before writing about this topic I asked co-workers to share examples important news that they had heard about from social media. I was shocked to hear some of the examples: seeing an engagement or birth announcement from a close friend; finding out that a nephew is gay through a status change; hearing about a best friend's mom's death and funeral (after the fact); a best friend's divorce and the list goes on.
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Then there are the examples of finding out through photos or comments about events that you've been excluded from like your "friend's" 30th birthday party, an anniversary party, an intimidate dinner or outing. So then you start questioning what happened and might not even reach out to your friend to ask for an explanation. Was it an oversight? Is it that our "best" friend is now the collective group that's on our social media platforms? Is it that she didn't have the time? Was the event spontaneous?
As a mature adult these experiences can be hurtful but they are temporary (at least for me). But for a young daughter or son these experiences can be devastating and even scarring. As much as I speak to my daughter about "real", "live" friends and "Facebook" "friends," she doesn't seem to differentiate them like we do through life experience and lessons.
For today's teen, the larger your social circle the better. It becomes a numbers game. But when you are 11, 13 or 16 year old your self-worth is defined by your social circle and whether you are part of a group of not. So more and more I'm hearing about the devastation social media is causing with young people when they see pictures of "friends" celebrating a birthday, getting together before a dance, or being out partying and their daughter's or son's finding out that they were excluded through Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.
I don't know about you but I find I have little control over what my teens are posting on their social platforms so all I can do for now is talk to them about it or let them live and learn the hard lessons on their own.
How have you dealt with it?
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