I do not feel detached and sorry to read that you feel this way. I keep up connections through social networking and also traditional ways of communicating. What is seen on Facebook is often only a very brief snapshot of the highlights of some people’s lives and not the full picture. I plan and organise get togethers to stay in touch – would this be a helpful idea?

While I haven’t experienced quite this “detachment” I think social media can bombard you with so many images and updates that you do end up feeling left behind. I once signed up to a few feeds from various sporting events (although only planned to do one every few months as it fitted in). Most events clashed with each other, being held at the weekend, but I got all the race reports and event gossip etc. for all the events I didn’t do (and didn’t intend to do). There was a sense of so much happening that it was overwhelming. I started to feel I’d missed out! The odd event that I did take part in was lost in the updates of so many other things going on. I ended up ‘unliking’ the feed to stop getting all the updates! I think it would be worse if the updates were coming from friends all doing different things because it might not be so easy just to block all the info. Would also be worse if there was a sense of having to ‘keep up with the Jones’ because what the Jones’ are doing probably doesn’t fit in with your own plans… but seeing the updates sort of invalidates the legitimate way you are living. Good luck!