Facebook Anxiety

[perfectmadness]

I joined Facebook a few years ago. At the beginning I only had a few friends and didn't pay a lot of notice to the whole thing. But over the years, old classmates, real friends, acquaintances, colleagues, everyone is there and I don't feel confortable with it anymore. Even one person from uni who I was not friends with anymore asked me to be her friend on FB! It's like there's no boundaries any more.

I moved abroad and my life is very different from the lives most of my old friends and "not so friends". I don't feel confortable with the exposure. I don't need to know about their lives,children and holidays and I don't want them to know about mine.

I know you can edit your settings, and I've done that, but I don't want to spend my life dealing with potential busybodies.

I deleted my account for a few months once but then I joined back again as my real friends and the ones I really want to know about don't e-mail or send photos anymore. Everything seems to be through FB now.

I've come to hate the site now and I think it's really damaging real friendship. Anybody feels the same?

Well I have never been a Facebook member, so I don't know what I may or may not be missing out on. I know I have no interest in finding out what somebody is having for dinner, where they are holidaying or what arguments they are having with their boyfriend on any particular day.
Neither do I want to share the details of my life. Maybe I will never be reunited with a friend from long ago, who knows, but I read so much negative stuff about Facebook and how depressed some people get as a result of it, it doesn't appeal.
I think any real friendships can still be sustained if you don't involve yourself in FB it just requires a bit more effort, and if people can't make the effort then imo, it is not a relationship worth sustaining.

Just delete anyone you would be happy not to see / speak to again.

I have around 100 friends. Some I see a lot, some I don't... but all friends.

One guy requested by FB friendship because I had a conversation with a mutual friend (WTA!!). He had over 2000 'friends'. Whatever works for you!!

No I don't feel the same but that doesn't mean that you are wrong to feel this way.

Why don't you delete everyone who's not a close friend, amend your settings so that you cannot be found on name search and only post what you want to post?

I have plenty of friends who get by happily without facebook, just takes some courtesy from me to keep them included in important things by text, email etc.

Use fb the way it works for you, don't let it dictate you.

I am a facebook member and have been fir about 2 years.
Im glad i joined as i have made some really good friends with old aquintences i which wouldn't have had without it due to not being in contact anymore.
If certain members bore you or they are not to your interest maybe you shouldn't 'friend' them in the first place or failing that you could always 'delete' them or 'block' them so they cant even 'find' you.
Just add people you know amd truely like thats what i have done

In answer to your question, no I don't feel the same way.
Use it to your advantage - there's no need to accept any friend requests unless you want to. Why would it stress anyone out??
Edit your profile to hide yourself from future searches. Have you considered that the people trying to get in touch might actually like you and wonder how you're doing?

It's an easy way to help stay in touch with people you might not see everyday. And an easy way to share photos/arrange events.

There's a lot of unnecessary Facebook bashing on mumsnet. If you don't like it, don't use it.

Cheers for the quick replies!

I thought about deleting a lot of people but it's like a slap in the face somehow, and I don't want to reject them so harshly either. I know it's all virtual stuff and shouldn't really matter, but it's annoying me a lot.

It's true that at the end of the day, if someone is your friend, they will be there, FB or not. But not feeling comfortable about doing one thing or the other is what's causing me anxiety. I know it does sound pathetic and adolescent in so many ways. But can't deny I feel that way.

It also bothers me to see people who know each other through me sending each other birthday messages on FB and not even doing the same on my wall. All so pathetic, I know.

Also, the other thing that annoys me is that a lot of the time I leave messages and comments on people's walls/photos and they don't even bother to reply or acknowledge them. I feel like a very unpopular person in FB, maybe because I don't use it much. I never thought of me that way in real life.

Again, I know, I know, so sad on my part.

well i love facebook...because i grew up in another country i have been reunited wiv most of my schoolfriends and glad to say we are all a strong support for eachother..

still have some ex's on my fb too as i am interested in what they are doing in their lives and sincerely wishing everyone happiness in their lives

i dont add work colleagues as they spout ya business off

i use fb to my advantage and only inform ppl what i want them too....as others have said, fb is a marvellous medium but can be quite right nasty if not used properly

I have a rule with FB.

IF I would happily walk into the middle of the road and shout it, then post it on FB. If not, then I don't.

Also, OP, I think you are reading a bit too much into it. People don't bother replying to everything and I think you are over reading people being upset at being deleted.... There are several times I've only noticed when I see how many friends I have

Why do you accept requests from people you don't feel comfortable about? Just ignore them!

I agree with what you guys are saying.

To be honest, when I accepted all these people from my past, I thought it was going to have the sort of support and bond that doormat describes. But I feel a lot of them are doing just that and I feel left out.

I don't know if it could be envy of some sort, as I live now in the UK, a much more desirable place to be than where I come from, but I don't like thinking of people like that.

I think my main disappointment with FB is that bringing all those people virtually closer doesn't mean that we are close in any way. I would have liked to feel close to my old uni group, but I don't. I feel left out and I didn't feel that way when I was at uni.

I've recently felt a bit like this too. My answer was to delete those that weren't actual friends. But rather than just 'unfriending' them, I pressed Block instead. That way you don't appear at all in any searches to them, so they think you have deleted your whole FB account rather than just unfriending them. Makes it a bit easier to deal with I think.

I disagree, Bigus, I have one friend who deleted and blocked me and to this day, I don't understand why he felt he needed to block me.

Fair enough, he didn't want to be friends (there are reasons I understand) but it really hurt to be blocked.

I think I does hurt to be "unfriended" or "blocked". Though I can see why people do it. And I've done it with a couple of definite "no, no's".

Whereas in real life you "unfriend" people gradually, as a natural result of time and distance, it seems that on FB that's done just by a click. To me, that's pretty harsh.

How do you know you were blocked? Have you logged on through someone else's account and seen he is still on there?

Hi perfectmadness
I feel exactly as you do about facebook. I too feel horribly exposed by it. I feel sad/down over silly things such as X replying to Y but not to me.
I get fed up of people asking "are you on fb, friend me on fb"
I dislike that people talk about it all the time.
I dislike it that other people love it - because they don't understand my anxiety about it and I feel they think I'm odd because I don't love it. I have friends that don't email me because "I only do fb nowadays".
Then they rant at me asking me to add them - fgs add me if you really want to but I'm not bothered about adding you.

It's like there is a big happy facebook party and I don't feel happy going. I don't mind that other people love it, I just wish people didn't assume that we all do, or that there are no alternatives.

I'm aware that my feelings about this make me seem as if I'm overthinking it! I do have anxiety issues and fb contributes to it!

Yes, i checked on my DH's account and it was still there.

I was shocked that he appeared to have deleted his account. But I was even more surprised to find that he'd blocked me.

Being deleted hurts when it's someone you consider a friend. But when it's only an acquaintance, not so much, IME.

I think though OP you are too emotionally involved with it - and perhaps you do need to distance yourself from FB if it's causing you this much anxiety. I find it a very useful medium but I can't allow myself to get all upset about trivia on there - just don't accept Friends requests from anyone you don't want to be friends with!

Thanks for your advice, everyone. I have to admit that I'm taking it a bit too much to heart. It's just that I'd love to love it and feel a part of it, like everybody else does, and I don't. And like ThreadWatcher said, it makes me feel odd and depressed.

ThreadWatcher, I'm glad to hear from someone who feels the same about FB. I also see a lot of hypocrisy in it as well. Like people complimenting or flattering people when I heard something different from their own mouths behind their backs.

I?ve let go of a lot of stuff going on in it, but I can?t stop thinking it hasn?t contributed one single bit to my relationship with old friends, steady friends and acquaintances. If anything it reduces human contact to some silly and constrained comment here and there, as you know everyone?s watching, and people don?t talk anymore about what?s really on their minds or what really matters.

I don't love it or feel a part of it either. I haven't logged in for about 7 months and doubt I will anytime soon. However, I do have the advantage that my closest friends, with the exception of one person, aren't on facebook. But the main reason I stopped logging in was because like you it made me anxious.

Thanks for posting too, Chocattack. I think that's the best thing to do if FB makes you anxious. I've detached myself from it gradually, but it's such an addictive thing too.

I also have a few close friends who I see regularly for coffee and chats. It's really those friends who keep me going, not the FB's ones.

Loopy, if I had known then what I know now about FB, believe me, I would have stayed well away from it too. Now I guess I've been swallowed by the monster, and just have to find a way of dealing with it :)