Facebook Folly

Today I made a decision to shut down my Facebook account. I announced that I had "culled" some 30 or so "friends" on my list for the reasons listed here;

People I never see
People who I don't actually know apart from their names
People who are decades younger than me and to be honest I reckon they sent me friend requests in a bid to get the highest number of friends
People who I rarely read their status nor they mine
People ...as above who I rarely comment on nor they mine.
People who use consistently bad language or blasphemy
People who inadvertently get hacked and then pass on a virus to my laptop ( three times in last 4 months )

I notified some of them as I had contact details and explained why..most of them were fine and one or two thought they may even do the same...and I wont even begin to bore you with the awful things some people feel the need to express for something as unimportant as a social media tool.

Now....of course if I actually knew how to shut the jolly thing down I would have but so far I cant do more than log out..!! I perhaps should have found out exactly how to do it before announcing it to the world....Techie daughter will sort me out when I next see her I am sure.. I plan to post this link on Facebook anyway to maybe explain a few things and let my family and friends know what is happening.

As an Academy student for one of my written essays I wrote about social media...I was more than delighted to get a "distinction" mark for it...if anyone wants to read it then email me and I will happily send a copy..I am truly proud of the essay ...sorry if that sounds boastful but at 58 to go back into a learning environment and get top mark was so rewarding.

Let me give you some background re my techie skills. I first had a mobile phone ten years ago..it was the size of a small text book...I had a "pay as you go " and 25.00 per year saw me with change every time. I never switched it on as I couldn't hear it ring..it had no vibrate as an alternative and I only used it because I cared for children with disability and childminding so needed it for emergencies only.My family and friends laughed at me and in an effort to rejoin the human race I purchased a Nokia clam.....oh this was fab...it was tiny and wowzer.. it had a photo thingy.!! I still went 25.00 a year and got change and it was 2 years before I took a photo and another year before I learnt to text.

I joined the family of laptop owners 4 years ago and began with..emailing...blogging...and then facebooking...I had absolutely no interest in twittering tweeting myspace-ing and all the other "things" but when Elisha my grandson came along I really wanted to let the whole world know about him....some of you may remember those "did I tell you I was a granny "days with status galore about this gorgeous child who rocked our world.

For me....Facebook is my way of blessing and being blessed...I have found friends from all over the world and from all eras of my life...Caroline in Amsterdam who I have known for 53 years....Sandra and Janie in Scotland who I have known for 44 years and 40 years....respectively . I have shared life with my sister in Canada and all the distant relatives over there...I have shared in the lives of my brother and all his family and almost weekly see pics of my grand niece and nephew and most of our family at some time of other will post or PM me. I love being a part of the community that live locally and are part of my work or my church...again joining in with their celebrations...or their mourning..or their ups and downs of daily life. Hopefully anyone reading my status or looking at my pics mostly feel the same.

For the last 3 months we have had a fair bit of distress in our little family down here in darkest Sandhurst...Cat and Nick had a third IVF cycle which resulted in a miscarriage...then my son and his partner had our grand daughter and sadly all is not well with this precious little one....most of my posts at that time reflected some of the anguish we were all feeling....most people responded with love and empathy and prayers. It is with a huge amount of distress and trauma to let you know that I has several PMs and emails which after reading I wanted to vomit the ugliness and horror out of my mind.Then to add to that I began to feel unwell...I am not going to go into details with that ...suffice to say I have been attending my doctor and have been using medication to try and ease the emotional trauma and pain...I am NOT blaming Fbook for the way I am now I know that anxiety and depression have a chemical base but is made worse by stress and distress.

A few weeks ago I blocked an old and good friend mainly because she worded her response to me in a way that I perceived to be hurtful ...I blocked it immediately because two of my other friends leaped into the thread and began to say horrid things about her...remember these were people who don't actually know each other ...they only know through me..I hope that my friend didn't get to read what they said but I also know I hurt the friend by blocking her. That event sent me into a real spiral and for at least 6 weeks now I haven't been on any kind of top form. I have functioned quite cheerfully within the home..my work..my family and a very small handful of close friends. Even with that I haven't wanted to actually leave the house only seeming to be okay with emails or texts. I have ventured out several times and its been " okay " for very short times and with a couple of friends who I am so at ease with ..as well as my family. I was so anxious about going to see Orlaith last week ..it was a train and two tube changes but meds and Catriona saved the day and we spent a gorgeous afternoon with both Andrew and Limara and Orlaith...imagine my joy when I got to hold her ...being careful of all her IVs and tubes and central lines...My heart ache as eased  as I sang..."you canny shove yer granny aff a bus " and I swear she joined in....then Auntie Cat got to feed her...so lovely and normal and together with Andrew and Limara having a meal with them..oh so lovely.!

The decision today to "pull the plug".(.at least when I actually find out how to do it ) was mainly about our new grand daughter Orlaith...she has been in SCBU in Frimley since she was born and last week after 7 weeks trying to stabilise her condition she was admitted to Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) which is only one of the two centres in UK which can deal with her condition. She is now 8 weeks old and is the light of her mummy and daddy's world and you will of course now know I am a granny again!!.. it has only been recently that Orlaiths mummy and daddy have said it was okay to post pics of the wee girly onto Fbook  One of my " friends " last night must have searched through loads of internet "funnies" and saw one which she said looked like Orlaith....I hope and pray that neither of Orlaiths mummy or daddy saw the pics side by side on this friends thread as I superhumanly deleted at the speed of light and sadly a whole bunch of stuff including some of the precious ones we were able to take of Elisha and Orlaith together...I had a PM from the "friend" who said it was meant to be funny (!).... I haven't yet replied to her yet ...probably wont until the words in my heart can be filtered through the spirit of God first..

So my Fbook friends and family ...all those I dearly love and care for ...I am going to have a rest...I need to heal...I need to support my family...I need to find joy again....I have had lots of comments and emails and texts etc and will be in touch in some way apart from Fbook at the moment. Please feel free to text or email me too. I am hoping to continue and blog..and desperately hoping I will get back to Academy after missing so much .I will post this link on Fbook over the next couple of days BUT after that you will have to sign up to follow by email...its easy to do on the blog itself and I may also send round a contact email so you can opt in or out....I personally always follow the persons blogs I like so getting them into my email inbox means I don't miss them...

In my assignment I quoted a fair bit from scripture and ended with this one..."Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way and may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you " (2Thess Ch 3 )