Has Mommy Blogging Jumped the Shark?
In a study exploring the benefits of mommy blogging, psychology student Brandon T. McDaniel found that moms who blog feel more connected to their family and friends.
The study of 157 internet-savvy moms showed that participating in other social networking sites such as Facebook did not provide the same feelings of connectedness or well-being. The trusting environment of a personal blog fosters open discussions about the challenges of being a mom, which helps ease the transition into parenthood.
I’m not at all surprised by these findings. I’ve been blogging for years through various ages and stages of parenting. I’ve made a lot of friends through blogging and bloggers are my go-to community when I’m home bound, sleep-deprived, bored, or lonely.
However, I’ve heard a some anti-blogging buzz lately: No one reads them any more. No one writes authentically anymore. Blogs are just ads now. Which makes me wonder, Has mommy blogging jumped the shark?
I started Every Day I Write the Book in 2004 and it saved me, in a way. I was not unhappy or depressed, but I had forgotten about writing and reading and listening to real music and talking to friends and having private jokes and being funny. I started having kids and switched into mom mode. This is great! It got me 100% tuned into my kids and what they needed. There’s a big learning curve when you start having kids. You have to jump in with both feet. I did. You should.
You can maintain all those good, smart, funny parts of you from before kids and add to them wisdom, selflessness, life experience and a giant, swollen, sore, joyful, ever-growing and breaking heart that makes you awesome.
But at some point you come up for air and revisit the person you once were. Don’t get too sentimental here— that person is long gone. Say goodbye! Kids are a game changer. But you can maintain all those good, smart, funny, parts of you from before kids and add to them wisdom, selflessness, life experience and a giant, swollen, sore, joyful, ever-growing and breaking heart that makes you AWESOME.
Enter blogging. It lets you use your grown up words (or not) and talk to supportive people (or not). At any rate, it can be an outlet that gets you writing, thinking, and interested in things again. It’s a good thing.
Unless …
Unless you fall in with some meanies who criticize and lecture you. Hey, it happens.
Unless staring at perfect, glossy homes and hearing stories of perfectly happy families makes you feel depressed or like a loser, by comparison. Hey, it happens.
Unless you don’t like writing and blogging. For a while there everyone had a blog and everyone was writing about how they were sorry the hadn’t blogged for so long. They had been busy, and promised “to get caught up.” Bleh! Who wants to get caught up on anything?! (Except TV.) We have enough things we “should be” doing. If blogging just hangs over your head like jogging and making nutritious freezer meals, let it go.
But …
Mommy blogging can be a benefit to your emotional health. You can use your latent talents and hook up with a community that is, for the most part, pretty great. It is free and easy to do. Your blog can be private or public. You can try to sell ads or get free stuff. I hope you make a million dollars with it if you want to. I’m happy for any mom or dad who succeeds in trying to make a buck from home with a baby on their lap.
I still think of blogging as an exciting new frontier. Your blog can be anything you want it to be. People tell me they feel better and have more clarity when they exercise or meditate. I feel better and have more clarity when I blog, even when I make typos and people make fun of me on Facebook. Hey, it happens.
What can I say? I’m a simple girl. You might say a cockeyed optimist who got mixed up in the high stakes game of world diplomacy and international intrigue and blogging and Facebook. It’s so worth it.
Read more from Kacy at Every Day I Write the Book.
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I often say thatt social media changed it for the better., Particularly since I had a lot of years of fairly bad health and didn’t get out much (and am by nature a home-body anyway) it re-connected to the outside world in a very positive way. And it also helped me rediscover and share my semi-dormant sense of humor. I had definitely noticed that recently the blog trend is dying down (my own blog-reading is way down, too) but I haven’t wanted to let my blog (even for what little it is) die completely. And I hadn’t made the distinction of Facebook being worse, because sometimes Facebook is GREAT. One of my favorite things about Facebook–along with finding long-lost friends–is that it has taken away my guilt for not keeping in touch with people, because now I’m right there to be found and connected with, and if they don’t want to or don’t have time to, it’s not my fault. But when I think about it, sometimes Facebook depresses me, especially when I see how uncivil and thoughtless people can be. But yet on the OTHER hand, when I very very first discovered blogs (before mommy blogs became trendy) they were ALL very depressing.
So I don’t even know where I’m going with this. In a big circle, apparently. But if research shows that getting back to reading blogs will make me happier than Facebook, maybe I’ll try it.
Ugh, typos always happen when I try to edit. I often say that social media changed *my life* for the better. (I think there are other typos in there but I don’t want to check.)
“No one reads them any more. No one writes authentically anymore. Blogs are just ads now.”
Exactly.
There is not as much of a community any more, it’s all about contests, reviews, giveaways.
At least this Babble community is more authentic, which is why I love being here. The solo writers, trying to find ways to ‘monetize’ are just turning the whole into one big infomercial. It’s too bad.
The moment I see a “PR Friendly” badge on a blog or in a bio, I’m gone.
I wrote more on the topic here:
http://www.cyberbuzz.com/2011/11/22/pr-friendly-blogs-are-the-new-infomercial/
This is what bugs me. I write openly and honestly about real life single parenting issues and all hell breaks lose. I am not an ad. If I want to write about the absent dad that greatly effects us in real time, real life – I shall. I try to write about my real life, because readers are more inclined to read, relate, share. One love. Peace.
I’ve been blogging consistently for 4 years now, and I’m still going strong. I love the creative outlet it provides me, as well as a singular space for me to “keep track” of all that goes on with me and our family during these sweet years when our kids are changing and growing so much. I desperately wish there had been blogging when my two oldest were babies (those were the days when the internet was just being invented, thanks to Al Gore). I so needed an outlet to connect with others and a place to just put stuff out there.
These days, I mainly blog as a journal. I know I have a decent following (well, as far as a small town following can go), because I get stopped regularly by people in my community who want to comment on my blog to me, but I don’t have many actual comments on my blog. Sorta puzzling.
I agree with fb not being as satisfying. I find it almost completely unsatisfying.
I like your guileless take on blogging. I appreciate that you are not jaded by people who are trying to monetize their blogs. You just wish them well! It’s refreshing to see a hopeful, non-snarky take on blogs and bloggers. And you are the very best example of a blogger–inspiring, hilarious, observant, and truthful. Please blog on. It is good for ALL of our emotional health to read what you have to say!
I still love blogging and reading blogs. I do get snarky when I’ve been reading a blog for a long time and then they suddenly get all ad-ish and give away-y. But your attitude is better. If someone gave me a million dollars for writing my blog I’d want people to be happy for me.