The Keyboard Effect

Social media is a great tool to use these days for so many different applications. With all of the free time that I have now, I find myself more and more absorbed into it. To be honest, if I didn’t have the blog then I think that I would probably delete my personal Facebook account. It just has it’s claws in me too deeply. The tricky thing about running a blog account is trying to maintain transparency. Is it deceiving if I only post my milestones and good events? What about the days that suck? The days that start and I instantly want to try again the next day? What about those days? The lenses of social media certainly make that pretty tough.

Most of what you see on my Facebook and Instagram accounts are my personal leaps and bounds in my recovery process, pictures of my beautiful girlfriend Kass and also a plethora of pictures of my dog Kona. I’ll often post pictures of myself out with friends and family. But what I don’t post enough of, if ever, are the bad days... and believe me there are plenty of them. Most of what you see nowadays on Facebook are political videos or arguments from brave keyboard warriors followed by hilarious Memes from your friends who realistically only use their accounts to share their sick sense of humor. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but speaking from my point of view, you’re probably never really going to see a truly negative post (at least from me) and I feel like that is misleading. 

There is so much that comes with this injury that I don’t talk about. There are some days that I just want to sit around and do nothing because I feel so low with my self-esteem or I’ll be in so much pain that I lose all motivation. Then there will be other days where I’m upbeat singing my heart out in the shower and I’ll feel like I can conquer the world. I’m also sure that it’s no different than how other people live so I won’t pretend like I have it worse. I just really want to stress the fact that it’s okay that not every day is good. That’s just part of life and there is no shame in that. If you go on my Instagram page, I’ll have weeks where I’m very active posting pictures and then I’ll go days or weeks without posting anything. Sometimes I look in the mirror and think damn I love my tattoos or see my arm muscles getting bigger from pushing myself in the wheelchair now. And other times I’ll look in the mirror and think wow I’m so bloated that you can see my belly button through my shirt. Stuff that no one else notices or cares about but me, and those are the days where I’m usually picking myself apart. 

If I have a rough night sleep from nerve pain or muscle soreness/spasms then it usually means and I’m also keeping up my girlfriend. Some days will just feel off and we’ll spend the day together and relax but good Lord can I get cranky. There are days that I just really won’t want anything positive around me and I’ll take it out on my loved ones and dampen the entire mood in the house. Negativity only breeds more negativity. Luckily the days are few and far between. I’m pretty optimistic and happy all around, but sometimes you simply have to humble yourself. 

I’m not sure how in depth I can really go with this topic and I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but I feel like I have a decent platform to get the word out that not everything that you see on social media is what’s really going on. People struggle and people have their own issues and insecurities. I may throw up a picture or a post of me having a great night out with friends but what you don’t see is that I sat in front of the mirror for an hour looking at my quad belly hating my new stomach. I feel like I should write more about that. Knowing that people have similar issues and aren’t afraid to talk them through may just be what someone needs.  We should use social media to reach out and check in on each other. It can be good for things other than mindlessly scrolling. 

Now please allow me to proceed to throw this post out on my social media accounts. I hope that this can stir up some conversations and remind everyone that what you see isn’t always what you get. It can be all too easy to wear a mask online. 

God Bless!