Help! Internet Chat Rooms Are Making Me Depressed- My Experience Of Ukchatterbox
How it all started..
I have to admit i've had a bit of free time on my hands recently, Hence my involvement with HubPages as a way to wean myself off going on chatrooms as I've found the interaction (or lack) of has been getting me down recently and I need ways to perk myself up again. I've also changed a few things in the non virtual world too to help me feel better about myself.
A great piece on the perils of Internet Chatrooms
UKchatterbox- lack of 'chatter' box!
www.ukchatterbox.co.uk
I've dabbled with logging into chatrooms for the last few years. I even tried the chat roulette style webcam chatrooms when I first got a new laptop although I've kept well clear since as have an aversion to other men’s genitalia.
Being in the UK I've always veered towards local area chatrooms and a few years ago stumbled across UKchatterbox which seemed to be a lively site with lots of local (or believed to be local from their profiles) users. Chat was often pretty positive and people genuinely wanted to talk.
Over time the site and others I've tried have become markedly negative and full of time wasters to the point where there may be 50 people online in a chatroom and at most 2-3 talking. This seems bizarre. Are most chatroom users internet voyeurs that get turned on by watching others write?
I need to kick my addiction as it's getting me down so I now try and get out into the real world as much as possible. I'm actually starting to not need my fix although at times I think I might suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and once I start logging on I can't stop.
I've talked in chatrooms in the past due to their anonymity. I like the fact I can talk to someone without them seeing me physically in front of them. I don't lie to people as I like to be honest and appreciate honesty in return. However now I’d rather interact with someone face to face.
From talking to a number of women online it seems that a lot of men simply just want to talk in rather adult ways. I'm not really that interested in a girls choice of underwear or clothing sizes and definitely do not have an interest in "Fun" as many people might call it! This means that women are less receptive to a male trying to develop a conversation as they think you're after just one thing!
I've been lucky in some ways that through chatrooms I've met some wonderful people in real life. I've even been on dates with some fantastic women that lead lives that are not within my usual circuit of friends or interests that I feel have helped to enrich my life too.
However I feel that now is a good time to break away from my use of chatrooms. Maybe I could keep them for special occasions as a guilty pleasure
Happy chatting
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Comments
Very good observations and what's more you realised the futility of it.Good hub for those wanting to break off free of chatrooms.
Thanks Darknlovely3436, that's a great hub while highlighting the real negatives of strangers online. I've added a link to the hub further up the page as I feel it's a great addition for anyone reading this.
Thanks Cherrycrime26. The internet in general seems to be addictive (no offence meant to hubpages) and people seem to be easily able to conceal their identities too. Now I seem to spend the time doig something I would consider more productive.
http://hubpages.com/hub/Cuttiepie67 i had a bad experience with a chatroom ,so i wrote this piece instead
Great hub, I use to be addicted to chat rooms, I mean I would spend 4 to 6 hours a day in then, someone mentioned to me that I had an addiction, so I laid off for a while, I still spend lots of time on the internet, just not in chat rooms :)
Thanks for your feedback cath. The virtual world seems cold and distant. I think technology has meant true communication face to face has been neglected.
I can relate to what you had to say about chat rooms. I used to be on certain ones all the time when I was a teenager and made some great online friends that way(some of them I'm still in contact with). Chat rooms now are far from what they used to be, though. It's too bad that a lot of people on there are just looking for adult conversations. It's definitely a good idea that you're getting out and distancing yourself from the virtual world more. Being able to balance interactions with others online and offline is key.
CyclingFitness 6 months ago
Thanks Rajan. Sometimes we need to see the world through someone else's eyes to be able to see the need for change so I hope this account is able to truely help someone