Social media makes me feel absolutely terrible

It doesn't impact my mental health at all.

It did when I was in my 20s and less confident in myself, and less happy with my life.

If it impacted me the way it does you, I'd delete my accounts.

You need work and personal SM to be totally separate.

My personal is totally private, ‘followers’ are limited to people who I actually would want to see in real life. The number of them matters zero beyond that.

Work obviously more is good but I’d sooner 100 engaged followers than 10k who would never buy a thing.

Why not come off for a week and see how you feel? What do you miss? What don't you miss? As a pp said how you use it really makes a difference.

So I used to feel the same about sm until I changed the way I used it. I have Facebook but I’m only friends with my actual family and current friends. I post photos from time to time as a way to stay in touch. And a couple of people I have muted them so they don’t come up on my feed.
instagram I follow comedians and actors I find funny.
snapchat I just have my dds, sister and nieces.
And I don’t bother with twitter or TikTok.

id either get rid or use it in a way that works for you

What nocool said

Pandas falling off tables is my thing

So be an adult and stop looking at it

Social media is a failed social experiment. I feel freer after deleting all my accounts.

I think you need to find another way to integrate yourself into your community. Best of luck x

Deliberately make the algorithms work for you. Most of my fb feed is now cute pictures of red squirrels and baby primates, as I decided that was better for my mental health.

Important to remember: social media has become something of a fantasy world.

You see what people want you to see 👀

They may have just got a promotion at work and posting all celebratory…..but leave out the part where they were completely fried and miserable working the project that led to the promotion.

I may post a “perfect” family picture of my DCs in my “perfec”t living room……but you can’t see the stack of dishes and unfolded laundry just out of frame in the kitchen, or hear me asking them 10,000 times to smile and stop poking eachother 🫠

Why would you still be on it if its making you miserable? I'd ditch it if I were you.
I just don't get the appeal of wanting followers either.....the idea of people 'following' me creeps me out!

Although, full disclosure, I'm a tech moron and have never worked out how to use social media.
I'm on a few forums for specific topics and that's it.

A lot of social media is all smoke and mirrors, people can be what they want to be. They show a life that bares no resemblance to their real lives because they crave for strangers attention and approval.
Why let other people's fantasies make you unsatisfied with your own life?

I honestly believe social media can breed unhappiness and discontentment if you are comparing your own life with others...my advice would be delete your accounts, and live in the real world.

Why not do a test Op? Delete the apps for a month and see how you feel?

and please remember SM isn’t real! One of my closest friends is having a hugely difficult time as a mum of 2 under 2. She regularly calls me in tears about it. From her SM page you would think she finds motherhood a breeze and is a natural earth-mother type with easy, perfect children! All fake!

Social media doesn’t make people feel bad. People who don’t feel good anyway, will feel worse looking at social media.

You have a you issue. Of course you should stop using SM if it makes you feel worse. Put it down, and find out how to improve your mental health.

I’ve come across people at work that get bigged up in SM to the point that I’m quite intimidated and nervous to meet them because of all their accolades and achievements, but very few live up to it. I’m usually very disappointed to find they’re just an ordinary person doing their job well (like we all strive to) but they’re just very good at promoting themselves on SM. Other SM junkies follow them and then it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. They become popular and have a certain profile but often it’s just hype.

(And mate - I know you probably didn't mean it but if you are serious about ending it all then for God's sake tell someone.)

Fellow autistic person here. Can't speak for everyone but social media has been absolutely awful for mental health. My problems are the same as the OP's - it's been said a million times before, but people only show you the ~1% of their lives that they want you to see and you always look boring by comparison.

For what it's worth it's very unlikely you're as weird and awkward as you think you are. As someone who's been in the same boat for much of my life, it took years to realise most other people were just going through the motions as well. If you have a look at some of the statements in the original Barnum effect study ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnum_effect ) it shows how insecure people are.

I got rid of all social media 3 years ago. I am far happier for it and maintain meaningful relationships with the people I actually care about individually.

I really don't miss it one bit

Please get off it. It's utterly fabricated false bullshit. Trust me, it really is.

I've a friend (loosely) that lives for it. She told me in so many words that she regrets having her only child (later in life) and feels he has put a huge burden on her traveling plans and marriage. The kid in question is an absolute horror (and I can see why ) yet she'll be ignoring him, then randomly pull him into an embrace with her cheesy smiling and declare on social media "my world in one picture. So blessed. Enjoying every precious moment " then will discard him and go back to texting her MLM "huns".

I wish I was joking but I'm not.

Point being - don't believe everything you see. Most of it is a mirage.

Definitely. I’d much rather have 45 people I actually care about than 1,400 people who are mostly strangers spectating my life and my photos.

Then change sectors, if you can't use it withput upseting yourself then you need to change jobs it is not normal

Then start a separate work account and fill it with work related people.

Unless you're doing MLM, you can keep your friends and family separate.

It’s possible then that work is impacting your mental health a lot. Do you work in social media marketing? Is it the work content that is bothering you most? If not, is there a way to pare down who you follow outside of a work context?

I know several not on fb and they do fine.

Get off.

You’ll feel weird for a couple of days and then your life will instantly feel so much calmer and less angsty.

I got off social media after a traumatic bereavement - I just couldn’t handle the insistent bleating of hundreds of people I scarcely knew about how rich and sexy and successful they were. It made me feel fairly hopeless about the human condition the total vacuousness of everything.

I came back about 3 years later, and only connected with people I knew well and genuinely liked, and followed some IG accounts featuring calm Japanese beavers carrying lettuces, and altruistic kangaroos, and that sort of thing, and that feels much more manageable.

LinkedIn is a total bin fire and not actually useful to anyone unless you’re a scammer or a very desperate recruitment consultant.

Hang in there & take good care of yourself.

This. I can assure you that "everyone" does not feel like this to an extent, and I couldn't give a flying fig how many followers I have/haven't.