I posted a lot of this as a reply in the psychotherapy forum, but have meant to start a discussion about it since reading some articles that opened my eyes a bit to some of my own issues. I had thought that finding this community helped me learn social skills and form connections that I had never been able to before in my life. And it did. But is there a point where maybe you have learned all you can from online social networking, and it keeps you from learning how to do it IRL?

Even my T started out meeting me on my safe turf at first. She agreed to try email therapy with me when I asked her to. After a while, that wasn't enough, and I needed to see her in person. After a while longer, email was dropped (she doesn't respond to email from me anymore) and it is all f2f, even though it means that I have to drive five hours. Because I use email as a crutch.

Is this a crutch too? Does it keep us from interacting with people in the real world?

Are we addicted to online relationships? Is this just like the other coping mechanisms we might use, like drinking, cutting, etc., that distract us from the problem for a while but don't really fix anything?

Here's the part that is re-posted:

How many of those who feel they are addicted (or have been addicted to other online support forums) have other addictions?

How many are self-injurers?

I ran across some articles that suggest a relationship between Self-Injury and internet use. A lot of it rings true for me. Some points are:
- that the internet appeals to people who self-injure because the anonymity is comforting to people who struggle with shame, isolation, and distress.
- internet communities may take the place of real effort to work on and develop positive coping, and healthy relationships IRL.
- online participation provides a sense of core developmental needs (such as need for community, intimacy needs, & honesty) are being met.
- if one online relationship goes bad, it's easy to throw it away and find a new online friend.

There may also be a connection with BPD. Those with BPD have difficulty moderating stress, react more intensely to stress, and take longer to recover from stress. They also have been shown to have an enhanced ability to recognize emotional facial expressions, including happiness, sadness, anger, fear, .... This recognition heightens sensitivity to rejection. Not being able to see people's faces here shields us from an overload of sensory inputs, and makes it easier for us to interact. But it also doesn't provide an opportunity to develop skills that we need to interact with others in the real world.

The articles are:

Janis Whitlock, Wendy Lader, & Karen Conterio, The Internet and Self-Injury: What Psychotherapists Should Know. Journal of Clinical Psychology: In Session, vol. 63(11), 1135-1143 (2007). Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com).

Janis L. Whitlock, Jane L. Powers, and John Eckenrode, The Virtual Cutting Edge: The Internet and Adolescent Self-Injury. Developmental Psychology. 2006, Vol. 42, No.3

Personally, I thought that I spent so much time here because it was the only way I could maintain long-term relationships (because I always move away and don't feel like I can ever belong anywhere). But those articles really ring true for me. The internet seems a safer, easier way for me to manage relationships. I have learned some good things, but it also tends to replace trying to have real, in-person relationships. It allows me to maintain and present a controlled image of myself that I like better than the real me. I have tried to be the real me a little more here, and that deepened some relationships while also bringing on a lot of rejection from others, and that has been really hard to deal with.