My Social Media Selves
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. Well, it was probably more of the worst part. In fact, the best of times hardly seems like a qualified way to describe my day to day existence. Ok, and if you want to get technical, I totally just ripped that off from a classic novel, but the famous line from “A Tale of Two Cities” kind of struck me as a useable metaphor for my own evolved personality. Sometimes I think when you deal with chronic illness day in and day out, the mental exhaustion eventually forces your own self to rip right down the middle to form two different “yous”. I kind of explain it as a picture tearing into two jagged pieces. It’s still the same picture, and you know they are two parts of a whole, but even if taped together, it will never be completely mended…not like it used to be.
You feel like all you do is complain and whine about what’s new that hurts, how your doctor doesn’t “get it” and treats you like you are the biggest waste of his time and how you don’t know how much more you can take until you finally break. You feel so guilty and self-conscious about the constant negativity that you do one of two things: 1) Withdraw and adopt the attitude that no one would even miss you if you weren’t around anyway, or at the very least breathe a sigh of relief at the reprieve from what you perceive to be your constant rants about something that no healthy person could ever begin to imagine, or 2) Embrace the split personality that you have fine tuned over the years and become the exact opposite of what you truly feel. You become the ‘laugh-a-minute, overly positive super Mary Sunshine that everyone responds to, while all the time crying inside knowing what a complete fake you really are.
Sound familiar?
If it does then you are familiar with my world…the world that I like to call my “Social Media Self“. It’s a world where sometimes I am free to express my emotion with reckless abandon and find that sometimes I don‘t feel as if I can see hundreds of eyes on the other side of the computer rolling in unison. I sometimes cry and whine…ok, I whine a lot, and for the most part no one judges me in this tight knit little circle of kindred cyber spirits I have cultivated. But those times are few and far between. Most of the time, the typed complaint only results in a few “I’m sorry’s” and a quick change of the subject with other tweeters. You don’t have to hit me over the head with a brick to know that most people spend hours on social media sites to lose themselves in humor and positivity, not to hear repetitive whining about a condition they know will never get better.
Remember that torn picture that masqueraded as my personality? Just as quickly as I held that one part in my hands, I tend to let it drop and pick up the other one. This part is a little bigger, a little more jagged, a little rougher and a lot more sarcastic.
Recognize her? Yeah ya do.
She’s the one you all see on a daily basis. She’s the one always with a smart quip, a snarky comeback or a funny daily anecdote. She’s my most prized possession, for she protects me more than any full body armor ever could. You see, this part of my “Social Media Self” dominates the net because she has seen how people respond to her. People like her. People know she will make them laugh, rather than make them uncomfortable as to what to say to her “this time” as she comes home from the hospital or gets the next round of bad news that week regarding a new diagnosis. People ask where this Social Media Self has been when she is absent for a few days, as she hasn’t brought the usual dose of laughter to the masses. People miss her. I’m pretty sure that out of my 773 followers on twitter, she is the reason for 700 of them.
I started venturing in social media a few years ago to seek out a world where I could just be me….with no pretenses or pretending like I had to deal with in everyday “real” life. In “real life” people knew me as BL Steph (before Lupus). They knew of the unstoppable superwoman that could party all night and work all day. They didn’t understand when BL Steph got her cape torn off and her high heeled dancing shoes replaced with sensible orthopedic flats. I needed a place where I could be Lupus Steph, and no one expected any more or less of me.
What I found was that people are the same whether real life or cyber life. They want to laugh, they want to smile and while they DO care and wish your life could be different and not plagued with doctors, hospitals, needles and pills, it’s not something they want to be brought down with on a 5 minute interval basis. As I have said before, it’s human nature whether you’re sick, healthy or anything in between. I generally stick with my Super Snarky Social Media Self and sneak in a couple chronic illness rants here and there when no one is looking. Let’s face it…snark sells, sickness fails in the world of 140 character tweet limits and the 50 response face book status update.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
I’ll just keep the worst part to myself.
After all, the show must go on.
Article written by Senior Editor, Stephanie Kennedy.
Stephanie lives in Fayetteville, NC and is the mother of 3 always hyperactive and occasionally adorable children. She was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus in 2001 and in the time since, has added Scleroderma, Hashimotos, Celiac and Degenerative Disc Disease. In her day-to-day life she is a Community Relations Specialist (aka, marketing and creative hodgepodge facilitator) and a part-time blogging snarkzilla. She can always be found somewhere in social media-land causing some sort of trouble. Find her on twitter at @steph_in_nc or on facebook at Stephanie Welborn Kennedy.
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