Day 2 Social Media Sabbatical

Well it's been interesting for sure!  Yesterday morning I posted a podcast / blog post about how the morning had gone.  Be sure to check out that post or head over to my podcast SLAM I AM and take a listen. 

I had my monthly appointment with my oldest daughter to get our nails done yesterday.  We use the same nail tech, so normally while my daughter was having her nails done, I would be chatting and scrolling.  I felt a lot of anxiety during that time - almost as if my heart was even racing a little bit.  I certainly did not expect that. 

After our nails were done, I suddenly realized - Shoot! I can't post a picture of our nails on social media!  haha  But then I realized I could post them here.

Here's a pic of my nails (the shorter ones) and my daughter's nails.  

It's also interesting to note the feeling of not being able to immediately share my experiences through the day.  It's become such a habit to snap a photo and post it, share my location, share what I'm eating, share what I'm doing... that it felt so odd to just go about my day without people knowing what I was up to.  Yes, this blog will fill in that need in a way, but it'll be more of a full daily post than a bunch of smaller updates.  I think it'll be a good thing to create new habits of not sharing every moment in my life with social media.  I think my blog posts might end up being less frequent as the month goes on.  But I did promise to keep you all updated on how this experiment was going, so I will definitely keep posting updates.

When I got home and made dinner I noticed that same anxious feeling.  It lasted for a while after dinner as well.  Finally I decided instead of just sitting and feeling anxious, I would get out my favorite word search and work on that.   Thankfully that did the trick.   After working on it for about 30 minutes, I started to notice I didn't have that heart-racing feeling anymore.  I continued to work on that until around 8 pm as we wanted to watch the State of the Union address.  

I thought for sure watching that was going to bring my anxiety back lol but thankfully it didn't.   What I did find interesting was that by not having social media access, the things that would have really bothered me....didn't.  I realized that it was so refreshing to just take in a moment and not have hundreds or thousands of other people's opinions / comments popping up.  I don't care what side of politics you are on - when something political happens, people cannot wait to jump on social media and share their love/hate for whatever it is.  I think I had a bit of an epiphany in that moment realizing that it isn't so much the information or news I'm taking in that is causing an anxiety reaction, but rather all the opinions and just the hate that comes with all of that - THAT is what causes my stress on political posts.  I did go to Google and look at some news reports to keep myself up to date on what's going on in the world as I feel that is important, but I really liked just watching the news clips without any comments.  

I also noted something else yesterday.  As some of you know, I have been in surgical menopause since late 2016 and have struggled on and off with bad hot flashes.  They will completely go away and then suddenly reappear worse than ever.  I tried to make a mental note of the hot flashes I had been experiencing before leaving social media and then again yesterday.  I thought for sure they would be worse, feeling my anxiety might be increased a little bit.   Interestingly, they were less frequent and less intense.   Today I'm noticing the same thing - less frequency and less intense hot flashes.   This makes me really wonder about why this is happening.  Obviously it's only day 2, so I'll keep track as I go. 

I also lost my phone for a moment yesterday which was kind of funny.  This usually doesn't happen because I almost always have my phone on me.  It felt pretty good to put my phone down and realize I forgot about it for a while.  

The things I'm tracking currently are: 

• Hot flashes 
• Feelings of anxiety / stress
• Feelings of calm 
• My weight
• My movement / steps with my Fitbit
• My overall mood
• My eating habits
• My daily schedule 

These are things I'm being very mindful of and keeping track of - both through this blog and my podcast as well as a personal journal I'm keeping. 

Today I had an appointment that rescheduled so now I will have time to head out to the pool and get in some movement and swim a bit.  I like that I'm feeling more energized already today and not wanting to just sit in my recliner.