An interesting blog post was recently written by the website DivorcedMoms.com, a post that was picked up by Huffington Post. In that piece — which serves as the source for this blog post — the writer makes a compelling argument to stay away from social media. Specific to her claims, the writer says that steering clear of Facebook helped her deal with the aftermath of her divorce.
The writer talks about the avoidance of social media from an emotional perspective. Constantly checking Facebook or scrolling through Twitter may be easy, and it will most definitely kill five minutes. But it won’t make you feel any better. In fact, it could make you feel more lonely and depressed. In turn, you may feel compelled to go on these sites more, and even to post sprawling comments that address many things in your divorce.
While there’s nothing wrong with venting in a proper manner, venting on Facebook or Twitter is a bad idea. Many people have the wrong impression about these sites — namely, that they are somehow “private” even though they are very clearly not. Anything you post on Facebook or Twitter could be dug up by your ex and then used against you during or after a divorce. Even if you think you’ve outsmarted your ex by deleting the pertinent information, such a move could make things even worse.
Ultimately, the lesson here is that social media is a very touchy matter when it comes to divorce. Proceed with caution when you use it.
Source: Huffington Post, “Why I Quit Facebook After My Split — And I’d Urge You To Do The Same,” DivorcedMoms.com, April 11, 2014