News

<p>Social media is an emotional landmine. At it&#39;s best, it&#39;s a place for friends to share their accomplishments, small moments of joy, passing thoughts and jokes, and for people to share resources and learn about things together.</p><p>At it&#39;s worst, social media triggers our deep insecurities, as we find ourselves comparing our worst in-person moments to the online highlight reels of our friends. Through the lens of the screen, it&#39;s all too easy to project passive-aggressive messages onto even our closest friends, assuming their posts about life reflect back on us somehow.</p><p>This anxiety spiral often feeds itself, and creates cycles of subtweets and internal dialogues that become self-fulfilling prophesies. All of this is to say, the distortion of social media can create deeply negative feelings towards our friends, feelings that likely wouldn&#39;t crop up in person when we can feel the warmth of who they are.</p><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2>In a recent <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/mv9u3n/aita_for_posting_my_childs_milestones_on_social/" target="_blank">post on the AITA subreddit</a>, a woman asked if she was wrong for posting videos of her son learning new words on social media right after a close friend expressed insecurities about her child&#39;s speech delays.</h2><p>The question itself opens up a larger discussion about emotional boundaries around social media, and if we should feel responsible for other people&#39;s reactions to us.</p><blockquote> <p>AITA for posting my child&rsquo;s milestones on social media when my friend&rsquo;s child is delayed?</p> </blockquote><h2>OP kicked off the post by sharing that her 2-year-old has been learning lots of new words the past couple months, and she&#39;s started sharing it on social media.</h2><blockquote> <p>My 2-year-old has been learning lots of new words these past few months like most children do at this stage. But one of my best friends confronted me about posting videos of my son saying longer words &amp; that it hurt her because her son has a speech delay. She said that my posts of him speaking were very shortly after she told me about her son&rsquo;s speech problem &amp; was therefore inconsiderate because of how soon after she shared a very vulnerable topic with me.</p> </blockquote><h2>Recently, one of her close friends confronted OP about the social media posts, saying they hurt her feelings.</h2><blockquote> <p>She said by my continuing to post even more of the complex things he can say does NOT make her feel like she is a close enough friend of mine to garner some sensitivity. She said it makes her feel shame for her kid, &amp; she&rsquo;s tired of feeling that. All this after she said her &amp; her children need to take a little break from play dates with us for a while.</p> </blockquote><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2>The friend went on to mention that her child has speech delays, a topic she&#39;d recently opened up to OP about, and seeing OP show off her kid&#39;s advancements felt like a slap in the face.</h2><blockquote> <p>She also said &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t need friends who remind me that my fears are founded. Right now I need friends who can sit with me &amp; see why I&rsquo;m terrified &amp; can tell me it&rsquo;s going to be ok. I&rsquo;m not here to tell you what you should post, only to say that it does have some effect on how I view our friendship, &amp; whether it&rsquo;s genuine or not.&rdquo;</p> </blockquote><h2>The friend also claimed that OP&#39;s social media posts ultimately make her feel shamed, and she thinks it&#39;s best to take space from OP&#39;s friendship.</h2><blockquote> <p>I was floored when I read this but managed to send a quick response saying I understand &amp; that we all have to have boundaries &amp; I respect hers. I also said I hope things get better for both of them.</p> </blockquote><h2>OP was shocked and surprised by the message, and tried to respond with understanding around her friend&#39;s boundaries.</h2><blockquote> <p>A couple days later I responded that my heart hurts for her &amp; I feel empathy for her, &amp; this clearly isn&rsquo;t about me. I said I wish it were because that would be an easier fix. I said I wish that I could go back in time &amp; redo how things transpired because of how this has impacted her. I told her she was right, I was not sensitive to her &amp; her child when I posted videos of my son. I honestly didn&rsquo;t think of anyone else but him in those moments.</p> </blockquote><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2>However, OP went on to clarify to her friend that the videos were purely about her son&#39;s learning moments, and she wasn&#39;t thinking at all about comparing kids or &quot;showing off&quot; in a way meant to cause harm.</h2><blockquote> <p>But this is where I stood my ground &amp; wonder AITA now: I said it&rsquo;s not my responsibility to filter MY social media FOR her. I gave examples of some of her other mom friends with different circumstances that could be upset by some of her posts using her logic. I said it would be inappropriate to expect her not to share these things because it may or may not cause others pain to see a contrasting scenario to their own. I told her I wished she had simply unfollowed my children&rsquo;s account &amp; had this conversation with her husband or a therapist.</p> </blockquote><h2>OP also went on to say it&#39;s not her responsibility to filter her social media posts for her friends, and that by her friend&#39;s logic, lots of their mutual friends have also made potentially hurtful posts.</h2><blockquote> <p>But since she brought this to my awareness, my boundary is to simply cut the social media connection. I repeated that I hope things get better for her &amp; her child &amp; that they get the support they need. I also said I am still here &amp; care deeply about her &amp; her children. &ldquo;And I am so terribly sorry that I hurt you.&rdquo;</p> </blockquote><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2>OP ended the exchange by doubling down on the fact that she loves and cares about her friend, and never wants to hurt her, but at the end of the day - she doesn&#39;t believe she did anything wrong.</h2><blockquote> <p>AITA now? Even though I know I don&rsquo;t post anything with malicious intent, if it was insensitivity or lack of consideration for my friend, is that still wrong? Can I apologize for hurting her, but also feel like I didn&rsquo;t do anything wrong?</p> </blockquote><h2><a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/passthealcohol/">passthealcohol</a> pointed out the fact that OP could never post if she was always considering people&#39;s potential reactions, and applauded that she responded with empathy.</h2><blockquote> <p>NTA. If you had to take into account how everyone might perceive a social media post you would never post. There&#39;s always going to be someone worse off than you or in a different situation and that&#39;s out of your control. If someone feels uncomfortable by what you&#39;re posting then it&#39;s up to them to either remove you or hide your status&#39;.</p> <p>I think your response was great because you acknowledged how she was feeling but also made it clear where you stand.</p> </blockquote><h2><a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Fun_Grapefruit_7015/">Fun_Grapefruit_7015</a> agrees that OP did nothing wrong, and it&#39;s on the friend to set boundaries.</h2><blockquote> <p>NTA you can&#39;t stop your son from growing up for her. If she feels bad seeing your son, she can maybe stop looking at your Facebook post? I mean you both know you are friends and why she would stop being on your Facebook account so I think it would be easier this way. (And you could still show your sons progress to your friends and family)</p> </blockquote><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2><a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/QueenYamma/">QueenYamma</a> brought up all the contexts in which OP couldn&#39;t post if she used her friend&#39;s social media logic.</h2><blockquote> <p>&quot;I don&#39;t like it when you post pictures of your delicious dinners because I am overweight. That&#39;s so insensitive.&quot;</p> <p>&quot;You are so inconsiderate for posting pictures of your husband when you know I am struggling to find love.&quot;</p> </blockquote><blockquote> <p>&quot;It is so hurtful when you post training pictures when you know I am disabled and cannot work out.&quot;</p> </blockquote><blockquote> <p>&quot;You are such a bad friend for posting selfies when you know I have a bad self esteem and could never do that.&quot;</p> </blockquote><blockquote> <p>You would never be able to post anything if you had to consider every possible friend who could be upset. Your friend is hurting and you wrote a very sweet message to her, but it is HER responsibility to decide not to see what you post.</p> <p>NTA.</p> </blockquote><p> </p><div className="ad-splitter"></div><h2><a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/No_Elephant3224/">No_Elephant3224</a> thinks OP was as gracious as could be, and that it&#39;s on OP&#39;s friend if she can&#39;t handle watching other children online.</h2><blockquote> <p>NTA.</p> <p>Amongst my friends I have people whose children have died, had miscarriages, have disabilities or learning delays. I would never post anything about my own kids if I was always thinking how my posts would affect someone else. Although I do consider my friends with losses and challenges I also feel proud of my own children and want to share that with friends and family.</p> </blockquote><blockquote> <p>My youngest has autism and was delayed in everything. Speech, toilet training, all social things. She got there in the end. I still loved seeing my friends kids doing and saying stuff.</p> </blockquote><p> </p><h2><a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Consistent-Leopard71/">Consistent-Leopard71</a> thinks OP&#39;s friend needs therapy ASAP.</h2><blockquote> <p>NTA. You are correct, it&#39;s not your responsibility to filter your social media for her. If she doesn&#39;t like your social media content, then she can mute or unfollow and move on with her life. I get that it is difficult for her to see her child struggling, but that&#39;s a problem for her to manage with a therapist and not by trying to control the behavior of others. The fact that watching your child&#39;s achievements make her feel &quot;shame&quot; about her child is very troubling and once again is HER problem and she should see a therapist immediately!!!!</p> </blockquote><div className="ad-splitter"></div><p>While the internet fully understands that OP is in the right here, the hope is that her friend will recognize how misplaced her frustration was, despite the validity of her struggle.</p><div className="ad-splitter"></div>

Mom asks if it’s wrong to post son’s speech milestones since her friend’s kid is delayed.

Social media is an emotional landmine. At it&#39;s best, it&#39;s a place for friends to share their accomplishments, small moments of joy, passing thoughts and jokes, and for people to share resources and learn about things together.At it&#39;s worst, social media triggers our deep insecurities, as we find ourselves comparing our worst in-person moments to the online highlight reels of our friends. Through the lens of the screen, it&#39;s all too easy to project passive-aggressive messages onto even our closest friends, assuming their posts about life reflect back on us somehow.This anxiety spiral often feeds itself, and creates cycles of subtweets and internal dialogues that become self-fulfilling prophesies. All of this is to say, the distortion of social media can create deeply negative feelings towards our friends, feelings that likely wouldn&#39;t crop up in person when we can feel the warmth of who they are.In a recent post on the AITA subreddit, a woman asked if she was wrong for posting videos of her son learning new words on social media right after a close friend expressed insecurities about her child&#39;s speech delays.The question itself opens up a larger discussion about emotional boundaries around social media, and if we should feel responsible for other people&#39;s reactions to us. AITA for posting my child&rsquo;s milestones on social media when my friend&rsquo;s child is delayed? OP kicked off the post by sharing that her 2-year-old has been learning lots of new words the past couple months, and she&#39;s started sharing it on social media. My 2-year-old has been learning lots of new words these past few months like most children do at this stage. But one of my best friends confronted me about posting videos of my son saying longer words &amp; that it hurt her because her son has a speech delay. She said that my posts of him speaking were very shortly after she told me about her son&rsquo;s speech problem &amp; was therefore inconsiderate because of how soon after she shared a very vulnerable topic with me. Recently, one of her close friends confronted OP about the social media posts, saying they hurt her feelings. She said by my continuing to post even more of the complex things he can say does NOT make her feel like she is a close enough friend of mine to garner some sensitivity. She said it makes her feel shame for her kid, &amp; she&rsquo;s tired of feeling that. All this after she said her &amp; her children need to take a little break from play dates with us for a while. The friend went on to mention that her child has speech delays, a topic she&#39;d recently opened up to OP about, and seeing OP show off her kid&#39;s advancements felt like a slap in the face. She also said &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t need friends who remind me that my fears are founded. Right now I need friends who can sit with me &amp; see why I&rsquo;m terrified &amp; can tell me it&rsquo;s going to be ok. I&rsquo;m not here to tell you what you should post, only to say that it does have some effect on how I view our friendship, &amp; whether it&rsquo;s genuine or not.&rdquo; The friend also claimed that OP&#39;s social media posts ultimately make her feel shamed, and she thinks it&#39;s best to take space from OP&#39;s friendship. I was floored when I read this but managed to send a quick response saying I understand &amp; that we all have to have boundaries &amp; I respect hers. I also said I hope things get better for both of them. OP was shocked and surprised by the message, and tried to respond with understanding around her friend&#39;s boundaries. A couple days later I responded that my heart hurts for her &amp; I feel empathy for her, &amp; this clearly isn&rsquo;t about me. I said I wish it were because that would be an easier fix. I said I wish that I could go back in time &amp; redo how things transpired because of how this has impacted her. I told her she was right, I was not sensitive to her &amp; her child when I posted videos of my son. I honestly didn&rsquo;t think of anyone else but him in those moments. However, OP went on to clarify to her friend that the videos were purely about her son&#39;s learning moments, and she wasn&#39;t thinking at all about comparing kids or &quot;showing off&quot; in a way meant to cause harm. But this is where I stood my ground &amp; wonder AITA now: I said it&rsquo;s not my responsibility to filter MY social media FOR her. I gave examples of some of her other mom friends with different circumstances that could be upset by some of her posts using her logic. I said it would be inappropriate to expect her not to share these things because it may or may not cause others pain to see a contrasting scenario to their own. I told her I wished she had simply unfollowed my children&rsquo;s account &amp; had this conversation with her husband or a therapist. OP also went on to say it&#39;s not her responsibility to filter her social media posts for her friends, and that by her friend&#39;s logic, lots of their mutual friends have also made potentially hurtful posts. But since she brought this to my awareness, my boundary is to simply cut the social media connection. I repeated that I hope things get better for her &amp; her child &amp; that they get the support they need. I also said I am still here &amp; care deeply about her &amp; her children. &ldquo;And I am so terribly sorry that I hurt you.&rdquo; OP ended the exchange by doubling down on the fact that she loves and cares about her friend, and never wants to hurt her, but at the end of the day - she doesn&#39;t believe she did anything wrong. AITA now? Even though I know I don&rsquo;t post anything with malicious intent, if it was insensitivity or lack of consideration for my friend, is that still wrong? Can I apologize for hurting her, but also feel like I didn&rsquo;t do anything wrong? passthealcohol pointed out the fact that OP could never post if she was always considering people&#39;s potential reactions, and applauded that she responded with empathy. NTA. If you had to take into account how everyone might perceive a social media post you would never post. There&#39;s always going to be someone worse off than you or in a different situation and that&#39;s out of your control. If someone feels uncomfortable by what you&#39;re posting then it&#39;s up to them to either remove you or hide your status&#39;. I think your response was great because you acknowledged how she was feeling but also made it clear where you stand. Fun_Grapefruit_7015 agrees that OP did nothing wrong, and it&#39;s on the friend to set boundaries. NTA you can&#39;t stop your son from growing up for her. If she feels bad seeing your son, she can maybe stop looking at your Facebook post? I mean you both know you are friends and why she would stop being on your Facebook account so I think it would be easier this way. (And you could still show your sons progress to your friends and family) QueenYamma brought up all the contexts in which OP couldn&#39;t post if she used her friend&#39;s social media logic. &quot;I don&#39;t like it when you post pictures of your delicious dinners because I am overweight. That&#39;s so insensitive.&quot; &quot;You are so inconsiderate for posting pictures of your husband when you know I am struggling to find love.&quot;  &quot;It is so hurtful when you post training pictures when you know I am disabled and cannot work out.&quot;  &quot;You are such a bad friend for posting selfies when you know I have a bad self esteem and could never do that.&quot;  You would never be able to post anything if you had to consider every possible friend who could be upset. Your friend is hurting and you wrote a very sweet message to her, but it is HER responsibility to decide not to see what you post. NTA.  No_Elephant3224 thinks OP was as gracious as could be, and that it&#39;s on OP&#39;s friend if she can&#39;t handle watching other children online. NTA. Amongst my friends I have people whose children have died, had miscarriages, have disabilities or learning delays. I would never post anything about my own kids if I was always thinking how my posts would affect someone else. Although I do consider my friends with losses and challenges I also feel proud of my own children and want to share that with friends and family.  My youngest has autism and was delayed in everything. Speech, toilet training, all social things. She got there in the end. I still loved seeing my friends kids doing and saying stuff.  Consistent-Leopard71 thinks OP&#39;s friend needs therapy ASAP. NTA. You are correct, it&#39;s not your responsibility to filter your social media for her. If she doesn&#39;t like your social media content, then she can mute or unfollow and move on with her life. I get that it is difficult for her to see her child struggling, but that&#39;s a problem for her to manage with a therapist and not by trying to control the behavior of others. The fact that watching your child&#39;s achievements make her feel &quot;shame&quot; about her child is very troubling and once again is HER problem and she should see a therapist immediately!!!! While the internet fully understands that OP is in the right here, the hope is that her friend will recognize how misplaced her frustration was, despite the validity of her struggle.