So today, as many people out there are celebrating their mothers, I have seen a lot of activity and people paying tribute to those beautiful women and I have been wondering to myself, what impact does social media have on the mental health and more specifically, the mental health of fathers?
I have grown up during the taking off and development of social media and its increased, instant accessibility through mobile phones. When I scroll through Instagram these days, I see lots of posts from people ensuring that they are showing their best lives to all their followers. You rarely see people posting photos of themselves in a less positive light. How often do you see an image that someone has posted with bed hair, bleary eyes and a dressing gown as they head to the kitchen to make a bottle in the morning and get a coffee for themselves and their partner?
I write this from a slightly hypocritical point of view, as I look to build a community on Facebook and beyond, but seeing so much activity today has got me pondering how this affects us in our lives as parents. Does this perfect world that is documented by so many people affect our mood as we inevitably fail to live up to the (false) standards that are set? Have we as a society become so disillusioned that we think this is what real life is and this is how parents should be and how they should act? As a knock on effect of this, are relationships being strained from elevated expectations? It would be really refreshing to see a social media celebrity showing their child when they are not always looking cute in a pristine outfit. Something to humanise them a little bit more.
I think this is a really interesting topic and as we look to provide a platform and hopefully elevate dads and provide a forum of advice and experience, this is definitely a topic that I would like to understand more.