Without facebook, I know who my REAL friends are.

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*apologies if slightly long. need to vent*

One of the greatest decisions of my entire life was to leave facebook. I am a very self-concious person and always compare myself to other people constantly. Now that I am close to the one year anniversary of permanently deleting my facebook account, things have gotten way easier for me in terms of my anxiety and where to focus my energies.

On facebook, I got constant invites to parties (I'm not talking abut sponsored and club events, but actual house parties and birthdays ), only to show up and only talk with the organizer for 5 minutes. I now know that the people who organize these types of things only cares about the number of people who show up. If they like you, you're invited. But when I deleted it, I became hardly invited to any parties at all. It made me realize who is a TRUE friend, people who would go out of their way to invite me to stuff and who would not. I no longer talk to may people who used to invite me all the time to their things for this very reason.

Case in point: I have a group of "friends" from high school, and I have a close friendship with one of them. The rest knew me when I was meltdown Annie, ignoring you Annie, and no social skills Annie. They didn't understand me at all when they had full blown aspergers, although some of them were nice and invited me to their parties and stuff. Now, my one friend from high school invited me to her birthday a few months ago and WOW were things ever different. One girl has A KID and engaged and another is having a wedding soon..I have great conversations with everyone since I had not seen any of them for a year...or more... This is what happens when you don't have facebook. The quote of the night was "IS THAT BABY YOURS?" - said by me, and everyone was mocking me for it, because yes, I deleted my facebook, and to actually care about the people in your group, you have to have facebook. It was so frickin' embarrassing. I am not surprised that I was downing some wine just to get through the night.

Anyway, a few months later my sister tells me that S. (the wedding girl) added her, so I go into my sister's account (she has a developmental delay so I go in to help her with stuff) and check out S's profile. Everyone in my high school group was invited to and attended the wedding. If I was on facebook, she would have invited me just to be nice. She invited so many people, even people she wouldn't have talked to...BUT she is also the kind of person who will invite everyone to things. I do NOT want people like that in my life, and even if I reinstated a facebook she would not be on there. I need a real friend who cares about me and cares if I am there or not rather than another face in the crowd. By deleting facebook, I have weeded out these people who don't give a care if I'm there or not...but luckily, it has helped preserve the people who matter to me. My closest friends still invite me to things despite me not having facebook, and I am so grateful for them.

Bottom line? If you really want to know who actually cares about you, delete facebook.

Comments welcome/encouraged.

I once started a facebook account due to peer pressure, but I didn't offer to befriend anyone cos I'm like the Public Enemy No. 1 in my school. Whatever. I was so happy with myself when I deactivated that account. Oh, I don't plan to reactivate it.

I myself am guilty of leaving people out like that because they do not have Facebook. The thing about Facebook is that it creates a very easy way to invite people. I wish all of my friends were on it so that I could invite them all at once. I was intending to invite this one girl to a huge dinner I organized one time, but I completely forgot later. That is because my mind is one-track and sometimes I lose the ability to organize myself so well to actually make a list of all of my friends who are not on Facebook and invite them, especially when there are too many things going on in my life.

I sometimes feel like some people in my life expect me to be perfect in meeting their expectations and they don't realize that the same things are things I habitually struggle with and are part of my Asperger's...

I was an early adopter of Facebook and the only reason I joined was that a girl I had strong feelings for at the time was using it and asked me to join (BTW, she is still on my friends list, though we haven't really had much communication with each other after we both finished University).

I'm very passive in my use of Facebook. My friends list is currently at 118, which is WAY less than some of the more "serious" users of Facebook. I rarely add people myself and I only accept friend requests if I am sure that I knew a person (either now or in the past).

I have never used Facebook to replace my real social life. I know who my real friends are (mostly because there are so few of them) and I am more likely to use other forms of communication with them (such as phoning or texting), rather than communicating with them through Facebook.

The odd thing is, while I continue to use Facebook more out of habit than anything else, I can't picture myself NOT using it.

you won't be using facebook no more Annie?

The main reason I even still have a face book account is so I can play 'Pot Farm' and at the moment facebook and another site simular but called myyearbook is the only way I can talk to my cousin since she has no phone and I can't seem to run into her on the college campus I want to know if she wants to go to a metal concert with me. I don't use facebook very often though.

That's why I hardly get on FB. Pretty much the only thing I use it for is if my sister-in-law posts funny pix. Other than that, it's mostly noise.

I would say I'm glad to be an old fart, but I do have a few acquaintances my age who think it's just *horrible!* *horrible!* that I don't like on FB.

My real friends know my phone number and/or email. Even my efriends know that much. If I go offline for too long they can find me. Anyone from college years who wants to look me up can find me through the alumni directories, which are even more convenient now that they're online.

Facebook has enabled me to have somewhat of a social life, since I don't in real life talk at all to anyone but my family.

When I am just typing things out, people like me and I don't run into the problems that their distraction by my autism can cause. They don't see it, and it's easy for them to assume I am just like them.

Dose anyone find it strange that some people add total strangers to there Facebook friends list? I know one person who has over one thousend friends and cant have met all of them.

I find it interesting how some people will be friendly with you on facebook and completely ignore you in real life. I also find it interesting how when someone posts an event there are always a bunch of people who will click "I'm Attending" and not show.

To the original poster, I think that was a great decision for you personally,as it seems you have thought it through quite a bit. It is different for everyone. I have made so many friends on Facebook, that I really do not know what I would do without it. It is the greatest source of social support I can imagine. The people I know on there help me with everything from practical daily living questions, to emotional support when I need it, to just laughing with me over something funny. This means a great deal to me. Most of them are people I do not know in real life, but have grown very close to online, and I appreciate how accepting they are of me. It feels like I am part of a community. I have mostly friends with AS or MCS (chemical sensitivities) on there.Just my 2 cents.