Breaking my own rules

I have debated for the last couple of days whether to blog or not about this particular subject, and if you are reading this then I obviously did press the 'publish post' button. If you have read previous blog posts you will know that I have certain opinions and self imposed rules (it is for fun, nothing too personal/detailed, keep it light) about social networking sites such as twitter and facebook (and to an extent blogger). These are entirely my own thoughts and I am well aware that many people will disagree, but it works for me. Well, so I thought...

I have had some issues lately at work (don't worry I will not go into detail here either) which have accumulated over the last few weeks, and sadly have changed my personality (hopefully temporarily) a little. I have been gradually more stressed, snapping at people, being more rude, not thinking before I speak, not sleeping, drinking a bit too much wine... you get the idea. (I don't intend to use this blog post as a way of just moaning that things are tough right now, it is going somewhere, trust me).

My rule has always been that I can have a little grumble in a tweet or a status update but nothing major, social networking sites are for fun. To me, (yes you can disagree) posting more details of such things is asking for support and help from people who are not necessarily your 'friends' is inappropriate, I find I would rather turn to real friends (you know what I mean, people you see socially or have known a long time) in such times of crisis, they understand me and support me well. This was what I always believed. Until yesterday.

Yesterday was a very emotional day (again I won't go on about it too much), there were tears, shouting, swearing, these are not good things to be doing when you are at work (none of this to or in front of patients I hasten to admit). But sat alone in my office unable to actually ring a friend due to being such a mess, I broke my rules. I posted the following on twitter,

"Just told my boss I'm signing myself off with stress. He thinks I am bluffing. Am I?"

Followed by

"I am an idiot."

See I instantly felt bad for starting the first tweet, but I didn't delete it, I waited to see what would happen. Who wants to read moaning tweets? However, a couple of lovely tweeters restored my faith in humanity and just by acknowledging the tweet and offering support, succeeded to make me feel a little better. I'm not saying everyone should go on and on about problems on such sites, but it was nice that someone would listen at that moment and allow me the opportunity to rant a little via DMs. Of course when I finally got home I text some friends who then rang and listened at length for a couple of hours, as friends do (I could not have really done that at work). Things are far from sorted so I will remain relatively quiet on twitter for fear of moaning too much and annoying my followers, but I continue to be happily distracted reading everyone's tweets and joining in superficial conversation.

I do now doubt my own rules though. How much should social networking sites be used for such kinds of venting and support? I didn't think a relative stranger saying that they hoped things would get better would do anything, but it did. I do still maintain that social networking sites should be happy fun places in the majority of the time, but is there anything wrong with a bit of support from strangers? Is it just attention seeking? Is it wrong?

I wouldn't be able to post in great details about work stuff anyway, due to the nature of my job. And I don't aim to begin reporting my problems via twitter or facebook, but I honestly would like people's opinions on whether it should be used for a quick shout for help (not in any self harm/suicide type way I mean for support/kind words)?

Please do tweet, comment or email (if you already have my email address). Thanks.