Paula Durlofsky - Logged in and Stressed Out: How Social Media Is Affecting Your Mental Health and What You Can Do about It

Logged In and Stressed Out

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD

Lanham Boulder New York London

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Is Available

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020944931

ISBN 978-1-5381-2667-7 (cloth: alk. paper)

ISBN 978-1-5381-2668-4 (electronic)

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

For my loving familyLarry, Sarah, and Hope

Soon after creating a Facebook account in 2009, I was hooked. Reconnecting with friends from my past with whom Id lost contact has enhanced my life in ways Id never imagined would have been possible. However, some time ago I began to become aware that sometimes Id be logged in for too longand not always for the best reasons. More and more in my therapy practice I started hearing my clients express concerns about how social media was affecting their lives and relationships. Thats when the idea for writing this book came about.

Having the idea to write a book and actually doing it is as great a leap as it sounds, and I have many people to thank for helping me make my idea a reality. To begin with, I am grateful for the many research scientists who have conducted and continue to conduct important research expanding our knowledge about social media and its impact on our mental healthresearch that has informed this book.

Next, to Dr. Salman Akhtar I express my sincere gratitude for the time and knowledge he generously gave me and for connecting me to my publisher, Rowman & Littlefield. I also thank the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia and all its members for their outstanding educational programs and for inspiring my continued passion for growing and learning.

My gratitude also extends to the team at Main Line Today: Hobart Rowland, editor-in-chief, and Lisa Dukart, senior editor, supported my writing and allowed me to be the resident psychologist for the Philadelphia area community. Without their support of my blog Thinking Forward, I would have had neither the experience nor the courage to write this book.

I also sincerely appreciate my fantastic tribeAllison, Laurie, Andrea, Amy, Heather, Jennie, Ellen, Kathy, Beth, and Gloria. Thank you for your friendship, encouragement, support, and willingness to read chapter drafts and, without judgments, to hear me out whenever I was feeling overwhelmed. To my best friend, Paulette, thank you for your pep talks and for showing me all the cool places in New York City to writeand for keeping me company too!

Words cannot express my gratitude and deep appreciation for my writing coach, Jennifer Divina, for her professional advice, unending patience, and assistance in polishing this manuscript. I also thank my editor at Rowman & Littlefield, Suzanne Staszak-Silva, for the constructive feedback and invaluable guidance she gave me while I was writing this book.

Special thanks go to Dr. Ruth Garfield, for being an incredible teacher about all things related to life. I thank my mom, Edith, for listening to me read chapters aloud to her. And, finally, I thank my husband, Larry, and our daughters, Sarah and Hope, for being my biggest supporters, my inspiration, my most important accomplishments, and my greatest joys in life.

If your social media and digital habits have reached the point where youve lost control over your time, your attention span, or your ability to follow through with simple tasks or day-to-day responsibilities, if your relationships and your mental health are suffering, take heartyoure not alone!

Weve all been there, spending hours and hours scanning Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, or Twitter, poring over friends and familys posts detailing their holiday season, their vacations, or their momentous occasions, which leaves us with feelings of depression, envy, unflattering comparison, and shame that bubble up inside us. Now, even more importantly, its important to ask yourself these questions: What was I expecting when I logged on, posted that picture, made that comment, tweeted that thought, or sent that text?

What you might be surprised to learn, however, is that passively consuming social media and other forms of technology, even when were feeling pretty good about ourselves, can result in our feeling way more sad, anxious, grumpy, annoyed, and irritable than we did moments before we logged on! The truth is that obsessively checking social media, e-mails, texts, and other virtual sites robs us of valuable time that could be used for our personal development and deepening our real-life relationships or forming new ones.

More and more, people come to my therapeutic practice and say,

• Im constantly checking my phone and looking at social media to the point where Im anxious when I dont check and log in and anxious when I do. I cant win either way!

• My best friend posted pictures of her new baby, and here we are, still trying to have a child after five years! I know I shouldnt go on social media and look at other peoples pictures of their new babies, but I cant stop myself.

• I cant get anything done because I cant stop checking my phone!

• When I look at social media, all I think is, Whats wrong with me?

• I havent spoken to my mom in two years, and seeing her on social media ruins my mood and whole day.

• I feel like my husband of fifteen years is a stranger. We can barely get through a conversation for more than five minutes without my yelling at him for being glued to his phone. This makes me so sad. We never sit down and have a conversation, face-to-face, with eye contact, and all.

For many of us, social media can feel like an unpredictable roller-coaster ride. Our mood can swing from elated after getting a slew of likes on a post, to worthless in response to being criticized in a comments thread. Depression and rejection can strike after you realize you werent invited to that get together you knew nothing about until logging on and seeing a picture of all your friends together, minus you. Distant, repressed memories from long ago can surface and get jolted into consciousness, causing an emotional meltdown you werent expecting or ready to confront.

Theres no doubt that social media has replaced traditional ways of communicating and meeting other people to such a degree that it has altered our experiences of play, connecting, exploration, dating, and meeting new friends. As human beings, our social relationships are crucial to our survival, emotional regulation, and overall mental health. Studies have consistently demonstrated that having a positive support network decreases the risk for depression, anxiety, and addiction. Our relationships are also important in that they help us develop our understanding of who we are, our likes and dislikes, our passions, and our interests. They help us form our identity, help others form their own identities, aid in our understanding of the world we live in, and create meaning and purpose in our lives.