Hello all! Mair here. For many, it’s been a while, and I hope you’re doing alright.
The end of the year is nearly here, and I’m here writing this in light of a very big, very important decision – I’m leaving social media (kind of). The ‘kind of’ bit revolves around this blog, but we’ll get to that in a moment.
The main bit of this is that after nearly 20-ish years of being online most of the time, and after many extended breaks, I’m finally making the decision to fully come away from the bigger platforms. And for the first time, I may not be coming back to them in the future – this go-around could very well be for good. After sitting out on the sidelines of socials for pretty much 3/4 of 2025, I’ve had a lot to think about. I’ve boiled it down to 3 points…(It’s going to get wordy from here, apologies!)
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1) The Internet is different: This will sound dramatic, but it’s the only way I can describe it – what was once an escape from the whims and ways of the world has become the very thing I want to escape from. Despite every good thing and every good person I’ve found over the years, coming onto socials – some days even seeing the frickin’ logos for socials – fills me with negative emotions. Since my time away, my brain no longer associates these places with good feelings. I know it’s very easy to say ‘just block users/search terms/keywords!’ – it works, but not fully. I even have apps that can Strict Block apps and sites if I set it to, some of which have been Strict Blocked since halfway through the year. But, something will always slip through the cracks, and even something small can trigger a depressive spiral.
It’s not to say that every person out there in the big wide world is bad, especially not my friends and family. But algorithms will algorithm, and the formula has been proven that these platforms will show you the worst stuff (and sometimes, the worst people) to keep you locked in and doomscrolling for the rest of your days. I’m not falling for it anymore. I can’t fall for it anymore, for the sake of my health.
2) I’M different: If you were to ask me throughout my 20s what I wanted to do with my time online, I’d have a few answers: Content creator, streamer, fashion influencer, comedian, artist, writer, musician…it’s an awfully long list. But reflecting on the repeated burnout episodes, a long-fought battle with depression, an even longer battle with anxiety, every single social media break I’ve taken over the years…I realised that I wanted all this for the wrong reasons. I feel like I wasn’t looking to truly showcase my talents, but more that I was looking for engagement, validation, fame, and as unfortunate as it is to admit it, cash. There’s NO SHAME in gaining these things from your talents if you put them out there, but it’s not what you should focus on – the focus should be on the talents themselves, and that’s honestly not where mine was.
At 32, I’m in a very different place now. I have a loving partner, a home to call our own, our rather spoilt cat, loving families side by side. Unfortunately, some of my talents have pretty much disappeared because I’ve left them gathering dust for so long…but I was trying my best to get them back throughout this year. I feel like I’ve finally realised that I can take on creative projects for myself, and not just make something semi-constantly to be thrown online in the hopes of a crowd throwing coins and roses at me. Perhaps I can finally learn to make stuff for the love of making stuff once more.
3) The world is different: One must address the rather large elephant in the room – the world is a bit shit at the minute. Even people like myself who don’t engage with the news at all will tell you it’s a bit shit. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, there’s something going on, and odds are it rarely looks good. Being on socials made that feeling of doom about ten times worse – not just people simply talking about the bad things, but even the most hopeful people starting to struggle with the fights ahead of them. Not to mention the people who have simply given in to it all, and resigned themselves to feeds and posts of nothing but the supposed looming end times.
I will be completely honest with you all, even though some of you will look at me daft: Every year since around 2022, I’ve always thought that every New Year would be our last. Not just my last, OUR last as a whole. I always went into a New Year thinking ‘yeah I’ll have good times, but we’ll all probably die this year so most things don’t really matter, BUT I need to make important things count’. And every year, thing always seem to be bleaker than the last.
Despite this, over the course of 2025, I’ve embraced hope and determination a lot more than I used to. I have hope that yes, whilst things are shit now, they won’t be shit forever. It may take a while, but the good WILL triumph over the bad with the right amounts of hope, determination, and fight. But if – AND ONLY IF – things were to well and truly go tits up, I honestly don’t want to be spending my time on social feeds watching an algorithm squeeze every negative emotion out of people, whilst hamming up that the end is nigh. I want to be by my partner’s side, with our cat, in our home. I would want to be living out the freedoms in my reality, not within a screen.
I will keep listening, speaking, donating, and fighting for a better future for everyone. It will go unseen via the online world, but it’ll still be done.
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So, after all that: Why am I still keeping this blog? Is a blog not classed as ‘social media’? I would argue that the answer is yes and no. The humble blog almost feels like a lost art form. It feels detached from the constant need for engagement and upkeep of the major social platforms…and that’s precisely why it feels perfect. I can simply post an update or two here, maybe even the odd creative project or two, and I don’t have to worry about whether it gets a load of likes or comments. Nor do I have to compare it to others. Hell at this point, I don’t think I’m that worried if it gets views at all! Simply putting it here, archiving it, would be enough.
I can understand if there’s friends of mine who maybe don’t want to keep up with this blog – it’s more peaceful, but not exactly as convenient as other places. But in all honesty? It’s alright. We’ve all got enough going on at the minute. Even if you don’t finish reading this whole post, I’m not gonna judge. Life moves on, and we all have our own shit to be getting on with.
This is simply to let you know ‘hey, I’m still here, and still trying my best despite it all, hope you’re doing alright too’. And I hope that’s alright with you guys 🩷
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SO, to clarify;
🩷 Instagram, Bluesky, and Tumblr are all gonna go. As of finishing up this post, Bluesky and Tumblr are outta here. IG will be up for a little bit with info about here, but it’ll be deactivated not long after that. If you see me pop up on these platforms, and I’ve not said anything on here, IT AIN’T ME.
🩷 Pinterest, Urstyle, YouTube, and Twitch will still be about, but probably not used nearly as much.
🩷 If I’m posting creative stuff – more than likely, art will be posted here rather than my accounts on Cara and Artfol (are they still having AI trouble?? Those two will probably go as well). If I’m posting writing, it’ll more than likely be on here or my AO3.
🩷 Discord will be very limited, possibly even dipping out of servers and just sticking to DM’s.
🩷 This being said, if you DO need to message me, then Discord is the best place to do it. Certain accounts will pretty much be wiped clean and not used, so I won’t be on there to check messages.
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And that’s it, really. Granted, some may look at this as too hasty, but it’s had an awful lot of thought. Amidst the time I’ve not been about online in 2025, the idea of just fully coming away from it all has sat in the back of my mind. I didn’t truly miss certain platforms when I was taking the proper break at the beginning of the year – I missed the people, not the platform. Even when I allowed myself to come back, not only have I not missed these places, but I definitely wasn’t on them as much as I once was.
Will I miss the interaction? Will I miss not being able to talk with certain friends as much? I absolutely will. But I’m doing this for the good of my mental health, and the new-ish love that I’ve found for my life outside the screens and the scrolling.
Will I go back one day? I don’t know. We’ll see where the wind takes us.
Thanks for your time 🩷
~ Mair / Pumpkin 🤡
The Clown About Town 