Has social media flipped the relationship pyramid?
Instead of a very few people at the top of the pyramid learning things early, followed by the rest of the world in ascending order of magnitude, now the broadest number of people are notified earliest, and the private moments (if there are any) happen later.
You may have noticed the proliferation of elaborate marriage proposals, "promposals," pregnancy reveals, and -- my personal least-favorite announcement -- so-called "gender reveals," which are (premature, ridiculous) announcements of a baby's gender before the baby is born. Add to these various reveals the multitude of people posting photos of their injuries, surgeries, sofa-eating dogs, and toddler's tantrums. Not so long ago, all of these things would have been considered private and/or personal, and/or deeply boring.
Social media seems to have compelled so many of us to not only post our personal news, but to actually stage it through photo-driven videos and Instagrammable moments.
-- Double-sigh.
Dear Amy: You asked for updates to letters that were published in the past.
I learned a lot from my own experience of writing to you about my grief over my miscarriage.
After writing to you, I joined a grief group online from The Compassionate Friends. This group was of tremendous help. I learned that I wasn't as alone as I thought I was.
Joining that group made the biggest difference in my grief. Secondly, I learned from readers' comments to my letter. (I also appreciated your disclosure that you had been through a miscarriage, too.)
People who write in have so internalized their own story they don't even understand how someone who only reads the words interprets the story differently than we live it. There was a consensus that I was marginalizing my living child for the grief and memory of the deceased child.
In truth, it was mostly an internal battle for me.
...continued
