"I will be back when I want it. Not when I need it."

There is this episode in M.A.S.H. where Hawkeye decides to give up drinking for one week after he receives his bar tab.  The first day he feels great.  A couple of days later, he is feeling grumpy.  On the fifth day, he is operating on a North Korean who starts to set a grenade off in the operating room.  Hawkeye catches it and with the help of Father Mulcahy, they are able to disarm the grenade.  It then shows a scene where the group is sitting at the bar and they order their drinks.  Hawkeye orders a drink.  Everyone is shocked and he says, "Hey, look, I need this drink."  Then he looks at the drink and sets it down.  He gets up from the bar and says, "I will be back when I want it.  Not when I need it."

On Thursday, I was folding some clothes and I just happened to turn on the TV to Katie Couric.  I was just catching the beginning of the last interview.  The show was about moms whose vices, or coping mechanisms of dealing with the day to day grind, turn into addictions.  I guess in the two previous interviews, she had talked with women who had used alcohol and prescription meds to cope.  The last interview I found very interesting.

This lady was addicted to Facebook.  From the time she woke up in the morning till about 3 am the next morning, she was on Facebook.  She had over 5000 friends...and most were people she had never even met.  She would read their posts, create her own, obsess over who commented and liked her posts and do it all over again.  She would ignore her family.  She said she may have been there physically but she was not there mentally.  She also said that is how she communicated with people.  Her family became this virtual world of people who she did not know in person.  This particular interview resonated with me.

Friday morning, I had a conversation with my husband about his friend's wife.  He said she was always on Facebook or reading and never got anything done around the house.  He was working and had to come home and clean and do laundry and cook, all while she was on Facebook.

I then found myself justifying me getting on Facebook to my husband.  "Well, I only check a couple of times a day for this, and this and this..."  Then somehow, me playing my games on my phone was brought up.  I had never thought about it in that way.  I do play games on my phone.  Especially at night, when I am not watching kids anymore.  I use it as my way to "unwind" from the day.  It leaves my husband and I both in bed, on our phones.  He reads "Tom's Hardware" and I play games.  Then I turn on M.A.S.H. and we fall asleep.  This is usually our nightly routine.

All day on Friday, it started to bother me.  Am I spending too much time on Facebook and my games?  What would I be doing otherwise?  Maybe I would read more scripture, lose weight, meet more friends in person, etc.

So on Friday night, I told me husband I was giving up Facebook, games and texting for 48 hours.  (I thought too much communication happened on Facebook for me to go longer than that.)  He was shocked.  He asked me why.  I told him because I wanted to....and I needed to.  I needed to see how addicted I was. 

So Friday night at midnight (yes, I was up) I turned it off and signed out.  Saturday morning I woke and thought, This is going to be easy.  I got ready and went grocery shopping, without bringing my phone.  Then around 3 o'clock, I start convulsing....ok, not really, but I did start to get anxiety.  I wanted to check Facebook soooo bad!  I wanted to play my games.  I told myself to snap out of it and I moved on with my day.  I cooked dinner with my family and that night, in bed, I talked with my husband instead of playing on my phone.

Now Sunday became interesting.  I woke up and immediately went to check my phone.  Then I realized I was still on sabbatical from Facebook.  I was doing somewhat okay until they made the announcement in Church that there was to be no more auxiliary Facebook groups.  That we should model after the Church in this regard.

Ummmm, I thought, was it premonition that I give up Facebook?  I mean some of the whole reason I was on Facebook was to check the women's group to see who needed help, who the new person was in town, when activities were...etc, etc, etc. 

I got home from church to find my phone buzzing with Facebook friend requests from people that I didn't know.  So I received permission to get on Facebook from my husband and jumped on.  I checked the women's group and found many interesting comments about the whole situation and found that many women had decided to start Facebook friend  requesting everyone in the group because of the "close" bond the group shared.  

I mulled it over and over how I felt about this.  I thought about all the times I had used that group.  Heck, that group helped me feel comfortable going back to church again after I quit my job.  I felt like I knew them because of that group.  It broke my heart.  Then my whole outlook on this "No Facebook"  journey began to shift into something more.

Today, I woke up knowing that I could check Facebook.  I realized I really didn't want to.  Then something interesting happened... my house got really, really clean.  Sure I cleaned my house before, but not like this.  Then you know what else happened... my husband and I had a really good talk.  One that I had been avoiding...  My anxiety of having my "blanket" with me all the time was now gone.  It was almost relief.  

I think Facebook can be a wonderful tool.  It has reunited me with some wonderful people in my life.  It helps me update my family on my life, all at once.  I get spiritual messages from it.  Really good recipes.  But you know what it became...it became a blanket for covering up real communication...and I never had really thought about it that way before.  

When was the last time I walked over to a friend's house to say "Hi?"  I don't remember because I have on Facebook.   When was the last time I sent pictures in the mail to my loved ones?  I don't because I post them on Facebook.  When was the last time I introduced myself in person to a neighbor?  Before I had Facebook...

Our behavior as society has totally changed from "the good 'ol days."  Everyone HAS a Facebook account.  That's how we communicate....will it change? No.  But I can change me.

I guess what I am trying to say is, I don't want Facebook to be a distraction from who I really am.  I don't want my games to be a distraction.  There are a lot more things in my life that I need.  It's been nice to have these "distractions" in my life but my life is going to continue on for awhile without it... at least as often.  So if you want the joys of being my friend, which I think I make a dang good one, let's do it outside of the virtual world. 

The ironic thing is when I am done writing this, I am going to post it on Facebook.  How else are ya'll going to read it?