Mental health podcast

Social media can have negative effects on mental health, including addiction, anxiety, and depression. People often portray an idealized version of their lives online, leading to comparisons and feelings of inadequacy. Social media can also contribute to conditions like imposter syndrome and bullying. However, there are ways to use social media while maintaining emotional well-being, such as limiting time spent on it, avoiding toxic content, and being active rather than passive. It is important to prioritize real-life connections and take breaks from social media. While there are drawbacks, social media also offers benefits like staying connected with family and friends, accessing educational resources, and communicating with teachers and classmates. It is important to be aware of addiction and how social media use may interfere with relationships and self-esteem. Overall, there are pros and cons to social media, and it is important to find a balance in using it. My name is Nicole Valdes and in this podcast I'm going to talk about how social media affect our mental health, what type of medical conditions that need benefits of social media like pros and cons, what resources we have to help our mental health and what medical conditions, how medical conditions affect our real life. So the first question I got here is how does social media affect our mental health? So in my researches I got two points and I think that they are really important and it says the platforms are designed to be addictive and are associated with anxiety, depression and even physical ailments. I think it's really addictive like different apps and other things that we can find on our phones or by internet and that type of things are really addictive. Many of them are Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Snapchat, YouTube and more. I think anxiety, depression, it's a really common medical condition that is caused for our own perspectives. In social media we can find good things, good information, it helps to find and get in touch with our family if we are not close with them, get in touch with friends and etc but also many people used to show their lives in a little point. For example, many people can post photos, videos and things like that when they are happy, when they are at the beach for vacations, when they are buying stuff like clothes, makeup, etc and I think many people also don't share their real life in social media and I think it's also because we always want or many of us want the proof for others or by others so that's why this says that they are searching for validation on the internet that serve as a replacement for the main full connection they might otherwise make in real life. So for example, as I mentioned, one of our friends can post a video or photo when they are really happy but they realize it's that that's not true or that could be true but that's just like an one percent or probably less than that of their real life. We don't know if they are happy, if they are doing for something really hard in their life and but yeah also in social media we can find different types of stereotypes about women, men and we used to compare ourselves and our lives with that people Influencers can show us really expensive things, really expensive clothes, materialism I can say and that's why many of us many of us used to compare ourselves, our bodies, our way to talk, way to eat and yeah so that's why I think actually depression and depression it's the most common medical condition that social media can cause. So what medical conditions cause and how does it affect our life? So by my own words I got the depression, anxiety and people stopped interfacing face to face, no confidence, bullying, delayed sleep, memory loss, poor academic performance and an example I found on my research is that a person experiences imposter syndrome when feeling chronic self-doubt and a sense of being exposed as a fraud in terms of success and intellect. I think as I mentioned many of us shows our own lives in social media but that's not true at all. So we used to compare ourselves with them or other people and we start thinking that we are less than them for different type of situations in our life. Probably we're threatening for a really big depression because we are not okay with our face, with our body, with our hair, with our life in general so I found I found eight tips to can use social media while maintaining our emotional well-being. So keep it brief, you may find that a few short social media sessions a day help you feel better than spending 45 minutes excessively scrolling through your phone, reading a book, watching a movie, spending 45 minutes excessively scrolling through a site feed. So we need to start charting our lives of internet. We need to probably look and read a book or just going walk, doing exercise, making food or trying to have other type of hobbies. The second one is avoid the swamp. There are people online who are critical and hostile. Some organizations trade on creating controversy, anger, fear and suspicious. If you come away from a conversation or site feeling angry, angsty or depressed that is your sign of toxic content. Keep away from it. So in my understanding we need to probably follow a really positive stuff. For example how to do food, how to do exercise for depression or exercise to keep our mind relaxed. But yeah we need to stop following people who just do controversy conversations and things like that just because it's funny or it's entertaining when that's not their real life. The third one is stream unwanted context. Over time you have probably acquired many online friends and contacts as well as people and organizations you follow. Some content is still interesting but much of it might be boring, annoying or irrelevant. Go through your list and unfollow, mute or hide unwanted contacts. Try replacing them with a few motivational or funny sites that make you feel good. Yeah I think as I mentioned we need to start following positive stuff or things that we have or we need for learn other things. I don't know probably something or a topic that you're interested in. But yeah the fourth is be active rather than passive. People who use social media passively just browsing and consuming others post feel worse than people who participate actively. Posting their material and engaging with other online. Also try to focus your online interactions on people you also know offline. So yeah I think that probably we used to follow like influencers and um we spent our a lot of time on social media so I don't know how I can explain this but um I tried to in my own experience I tried to interact with my friends in Mexico because all of them are in Mexico. I got a few friends here in the United States but um it's really good to have my friends on social media because I really miss them and um we know to each other through social media like Instagram, Facebook that type of thing. And also I can see my family because my family is living in Mexico so I try to don't be so deep at social media or TikTok and things like that. But if I am honest I spend a lot of time at night watching videos and things like that. Instead of going to sleep or do homework and I feel like that is making me feel so boring to be here inside my apartment just with my phone my doggie and things like that. But yeah then prioritize people. You'll connect better with people in your life if you have certain time each day when your social media notifications are off. So I try to keep my phone off when I'm in classes but as I'm in medical conditions I cannot do that. I need to have my phone every single time online because I need to probably check my blood sugar or I got some remindings about my medication or my mom is trying to get in touch with me just to see if I'm okay if I am feeling okay things like that. But if I'm honest um when I get boring in a class because I need to be honest that could happen I go through my phone and I'm gonna start watching a lot of stuff instead of putting attention but that's not happened so often but that's not okay. Then take breaks schedule regular breaks from social media. Yeah I think as we mentioned at the first one we need to probably just see a couple of minutes just to I don't know to get a relax but not like spending our whole day getting relaxed in our phones. So yeah because I think and I I can say that my by my own experience um spending a lot of time in our phones can make us feel horrible like no no I don't know how I can explain that like literally I just start thinking about horrible stuff horrible scenarios horrible things I don't really know why but probably because of news probably because I knew that one of my friends is sick or my grandma is getting more old things like that and I started having a lot of troubles in my mind. So yeah I need to say we need to take a really long long break of our social media our phones and everything so don't let it replace real life. Yeah like I think many people start believing that for example if we saw a woman who is really beautiful and that's okay to admit that a woman is beautiful or a man um we start comparing to each other like if they have beautiful curls and my hair is no curly anymore I'm gonna start comparing myself or if I I'm thinking that I'm fat and I just saw other people who is not fat I'm gonna start getting stressed I don't know I don't really know and also if we don't let if we let us replace our real life in these things probably we're gonna stop talking to our friends our family face to face as I mentioned probably in my situation but that does not mean that it's the right thing I need to be in contact with my family by phone face time blah blah but um yeah I try to get in touch with my friends here in CUNY or at the universities and hang out probably just go and walk to the mall or buy a Starbucks coffee food things like that to do something else and be aware of addiction if social media uses interferes very with your relationship self-esteem work or school but you can stop using it you may be addicted as I mentioned I think um I don't know like I think it's kind of like a drug or something like that like you cannot stop watching because probably you're watching the new friends the new makeup the new uh beautiful places that are that are are I'm sorry that are around the world but I don't know I think we need to uh notice when that is going on so we talk about bad things a little bit of tips but now we're gonna talk about pros and cons about social media uh I think the positive aspects of social media is that our ability to get in touch with a family friend around the world as I mentioned but also we can do homework through internet and get in touch or in contact with um our teachers if we need to do that or our friends if we need to talk about an assignment or our classmates if we need to do a project things like that so uh I think one I'm just gonna read three pros of social media and I'm gonna try to go deep on it so uh online learning job skills content discovery as youtube so I think that's a really good pro because as I mentioned we can found many information for our homework or it probably it's not for homework it's just for fun because I want to know something I can go through internet and find what I need to but as we were talking in our classes we need to start um trying to identify what um classes or classes I'm sorry what what information is real and yeah because the misinformation is also other problems so uh job skills yeah just learn learn learn learn and we can learn about bad things but also good things I don't know it's kind of controversial topic but yeah um content discovery content discovery yeah we can see videos of how to cook how to train our ducks how to do art I don't know we can find good things um opportunity for remote employment yeah I think many people don't like and go and work at office or something like that and I think you can spend a really good time with your family where while you're working at home but I don't know if that's a good idea too I don't know um yeah a really huge pro I think in my perspective and my opinion is that staying connected with family and friends worthwhile by uh I'm sorry via I don't know how to say that I'm sorry email text face time whatsapp things like so other I'm gonna read three cons about social media um well I think bullying and cyber bullying is one I don't know why I put two but I think it's one con that means they use by one more students of writing verbal or electronic expression or a physical act or gesture or any combination thereof um direct at a student I mean I think people also can be rude and can be horrible in in a way like I don't know why people and I'm never gonna be agree with that but I don't know why people feel like to say something horrible about our bodies our nationality our skin of color our accents or whatever because people can find whatever thing to do bullying like I don't understand that but anyways I think that's a really huge problem uh sales image issue as I said like body image concerns um and um yeah I start comparing online versus reality live with our friends things like that are really cons of social media so right now I'm gonna talk about how like our I just wanted to talk about this topic because I found a podcast called um Chromatic Beings that podcast is from Mexico and they talk about their lives literally their lives how um they experience their lives working through social media and things like that and that podcast is um directed and produced by Alan Rosa and the guy who is the who is doing the interview is called Danny Villa and they are from Mexico and this girl she's Sofia Castro she's from Colombia she's really a really icon from Colombia I think it's influencer she talked about how the hate that she received through social media affect her her like their body their mental health a lot of things and at the point that she just wanna make something horrible with her life so she decided to take him by herself at a hospital like psychiatric hospital because she was not handle that and I think that's totally fine and understandable since there I think there's a point that you cannot control that anymore and you just just just can't handle that like and it's okay and also it's okay to to ask for help ask for for information because probably we have these hospitals so stereotyped and that's why we are afraid of it but probably that's a good thing to to do like I don't know probably going to um a psych a therapist and things like that many people think that's just like spending money in nothing but I think that's not true um okay I think that in my own experience thinking about different stereotypes of body how to talk how to act and basically how to be on social media it's not true at all yeah um I think uh well I'm going to talk about a little bit about more about I'm sorry about me and two years ago I just get diagnosed with hyperthyroidism and other uh chronical uh disease and I was also diagnosed with diabetes um lakush and grave syndrome and that started making my body out of control like my hair started falling my eyes start hurting me and getting these I'm starting getting like weighting fast weight I'm sorry and um I didn't understand really at that moment I felt that probably I was doing something bad like anxiety or I was eating more food or I was stopping doing um stop doing um exercise and things like that and that makes me like having or getting weight like getting fat I don't know so that makes me feel horrible because I saw my friends up who were so tiny or skinny but then I realized that was my my medical condition it was not by myself that was not my decision but I need to go step by step for two years to can understand a little bit more about that but that makes me feel horrible and also probably our the people who's around us didn't help me at that time or help us at that time or whatever you're doing and that basically makes me feel worse like I don't know probably my friends every single time we saw or we hang out they were like oh Nicole is getting fat or Nicole is not having a really beautiful hair or she's looking totally different at his face at the time at her face her eyes and probably they don't think that they are doing something bad and I'm not saying that they are doing something bad probably they don't know a lot of stuff or they do but they don't care and that makes me get a lot of depression actually um I don't know I was feeling so bad but I just started going and see my therapist and she helps me and also I do and I put a really effort to to be against that feelings that things and thoughts and right now I can say that probably I'm not okay with myself but I think that's totally normal or not normal but it's it take a lot of time to to start loving yourself or accepting how you are now or whatever because also everybody's used to going through a lot of changes so yeah that's my own experience and I think as I said in my opinion we can see that in our social media we used to post our best life and we used to post a lot of beautiful things and that make us get confused but I think also there are a lot of also there are a lot of people who post their real life they are more clear and crystal with the rest of the people and I think that helps us a little bit more I don't know that's my opinion and I think I don't have a conclusion right now I don't have an ending song and I think I need to I don't know to put everything on their place to can like in order and organize a little bit more to can talk more continuous but yeah I try to just follow the steps I got here at my sketch but yeah I think that's everything for the moment and yeah