Week 4 -
It's BBQ week. I had to put Facebook back on my phone today. I was delivering potatoes and knew people would contact me through our group page. The biggest thing I noticed was the overwhelming presence of weather people on Facebook. Every time I jumped on, I was bombarded with weather warnings. People were texting me, worried about me being in a parking lot passing out potatoes in a possible tornado. I jokingly told a friend, I think the pharmaceutical company has a contract with the meteorologists. Everything in my news feed was producing anxiety over the upcoming weather. I did something I haven't done in years and watched the news at noon. I wanted to see what they were saying live. The basic answer was that storms are coming. Like all spring storms in the Midwest, a tornado was possible. It was very obvious to me that scrolling through weather reports all day on your phone creates a sense of fear that doesn't need to be there.
Week 5 -
I would say this is a normal week. I've taken fewer pictures at some of our events because I wasn't thinking about posting things. I did miss scrolling while on a road trip. Normally, I would just read, but in the last few years, I've started getting car sick reading. So sitting for 2 hours without anything to do made for a long day. I forgot my earbuds, so no audiobooks. I won't make that mistake again.
Week 6 and beyond:
That's a wrap on social media fasting. The biggest thing I noticed this week is how much my husband is on his phone. I think after 6 weeks, it just really started to annoy me. Normally, we would both be on devices, and I wouldn't have noticed what he was doing. Since I was reading a book or trying to have a conversation with him, I noticed how much of his evening he spends with his face in a screen. Don't get me started on how much screen time my kids have now that they are teenagers.
Now what?
I've taken Facebook off my phone. If I need to check something, I can log onto the computer. I'll jump on once a week and upload pictures. Facebook for me is basically a scrapbook of my life. I really have no self-control. If I jump on to check something I start scrolling and can get sucked in for hours. The best way to make sure that doesn't happen is to not have access to it at my fingertips. I'll keep Instagram unless it replaces Facebook with my doom scrolling. Anything I want to post that is happening at the moment will be there.
Over all I didn't really miss it. Once a week was enough to catch up with things. I know I missed events that happened during my fast. Now I know to add things to my personal calendar if I want to attend something I see on Facebook.
If you're interested in doing a 40 day social media fast I highly recommend this book!
You can read part 1 HERE
