06. The real reason I quit Instagram (despite 200k followers)

6th installment of the memoir:ish column-to-be-book “How to be a Mother-Artist”

Hi there!

In case you missed any of the previous installments in the “Mother-Artist” column-to-be-book you can check it out here: https://elinpetronella.substack.com/t/mother-artist

And in case this is the first time; Welcome! Most essays on Follow Your Gut at free to read, but this is not one of them. It’s part of the serialisation of the follow up sequel to my self-published book “When will you get a real job”, which you can download as an e-book instantly upon upgrading. Can’t wait to have you 🥰💖

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Preview

I was set to give birth in June 2020. A lot of things happened in June 2020 for many people around the world.

It wasn’t just the first summer of the pandemic, the BLM movement also sprung to life in the US, and social media became an international battlefield.

What had been a “you share what you’re an expert at”, became a global social phenomenon of “you must use your large platforms for social justice”, or in other words you must share the little black square on your grid and continuously inform and educate your audience about the events like a news reporter.

The pressure was real for accounts with significant audiences (we had 300k+ between the two of us on Instagram alone).

I was 38 weeks pregnant and it was a hot summer.

My husband and I had worked hard to prepare months worth of work that was scheduled using a software so that our social media marketing would resume as usual despite our planned absence.

To some extent I felt as though we had employed digital assistants to support us throughout the transition into parenting and still allow us to bring new clients into our business.

I was excited. Scared. Happy. And nervous.

But I felt prepared, ready. It was all going according to plan. Until 5th of June that is.

What I’m about to tell you is something I’ve never written about before. And it feels difficult to say. It’s as if it’s stiffening up in my through, the blood runs quicker through my veins as I type.

It’s difficult still today, does that mean that what happened was to some extent traumatic?

I think it was.

If nothing else, it changed the trajectory of our social media presence forever. As of writing this, it’s 4 years later (July 2024) and I still haven’t gotten back to posting regularly on Instagram. And I probably never will.