Recently, Google announced the most searched words. Although we laughed and had fun with many of these words, what is searched after the sentences that start with “Why am I…” is very thought-provoking. Of course, these searches are not a criterion for generalizing the whole country, but the depressive mood in the first 10 searches starting with “Why am I…” is visibly evident.
Even if you didn’t, people around you may have made these calls. So why did the number of people feel bad so much? It is clear that something went wrong and today we will try to understand and solve those things together.
First of all, let’s take a look at those well-known Google searches again. This is how we finished the sentence “Why am I…”:
- why am i not loved
- why am i so ugly
- why was i born
- why am i excluded
- why am i a loser
- why am i crying
- why am i like this
- why am i alone
- why am i living
- Why did I stay at home
Let’s take a closer look at these searches.
When we look at these sentences in the top 10, we see that there is an intense increase in February, June and July. The reason for this increase is quite natural as it is ‘Valentine’s Day’ in February. There’s nothing more normal than feeling more miserable when there are hearts and happy couples everywhere you look.
As for what happens in June and July; You may remember that with the introduction of Covid-19 into our lives, we went through a long pandemic process. When we say curfews, the obligation to wear masks and restrictions, we are pretty bored. We experienced the last curfews in June. During this process, some of us were at home with our families, some with our friends, and some alone. Even if we are not alone in these last days when we are closed in our homes, we have sometimes felt alone. When we came to July, we started to go out and socialize. This time, we felt alone in the crowds.
Moreover, we started to use the internet more.
According to TUIK data; In 2022, the rate of internet usage among individuals aged 16-74 reached 85%. Last year, this rate was 82.6%. The rate of households with internet access increased at a similar rate to 94.1%.
The use of the internet and social media has also increased to a great extent in adolescents. During the adolescence period that we all go through, individuals tend to isolate themselves from the social world and feel unloved. The increase in the use of the internet by individuals in this period is also related to the question “Why am I not loved?” It can be a factor in the fact that sentences such as Google are the most searched for in the Google search engine.
Of course, we cannot attribute everything to Covid-19.
One of the activities we did most while sitting in our homes during the pandemic process was surfing social media. The number of applications we use and the time we spend in front of the phone, computer and television have also increased drastically.
The reflections of the virtual world on us also affected our psychology negatively. Because whenever we went on Instagram and Twitter, we saw beautiful/handsome people. As a result of this, we started to dislike ourselves and our self-confidence gradually decreased.
The decrease in our self-confidence also affected our social relations.
We started to have more hesitation about entering crowded environments and making new friends. Because the perception of beauty that social media brought into our lives had taken us all under its influence and we started to dislike ourselves. So we thought that other people wouldn’t like us either.
…And as a result, we fell into depression.
- According to OECD data, the increase in antidepressant use rates between 2010 and 2020.
According to OECD data, daily antidepressant use has increased by 50% between 2010 and 2020. You know that for a while there were great prejudices about using antidepressants and getting psychological support in our country. When we talk about the news we see, economic conditions, social pressures, the rates of depression are increasing. So it would be wrong to say that there is only one cause of our depression.
However, according to TUIK data, divorce rates have also increased in recent years. In other words, we could not succeed in our bilateral relations…
While our grandfathers and grandmothers were communicating by letter and waiting to see each other by the fountain, their relationship life was much easier. Because they did not see different faces every second through a small box in their hands. They see whoever is around them, and when they like someone, “Can I see a more beautiful one?” they didn’t act on their minds.
Today, we can meet all kinds of people in countless applications on our phones. For this reason, the thought that there may be someone more beautiful, better and more thoughtful than the person in front of us can be on the side of our minds. We don’t appreciate what we have, we want more. Unfortunately, our desire for ‘more’ often results in frustration. As a result, we become lonely, unhappy, and depressed.
So we do everything ourselves.
If you think that you are stuck in any issue, if you feel unhappy and depressed, you should not hesitate to seek psychological support. We are human, we all need to love and be loved. But we must first start by loving ourselves.
None of us can be like the men/women we see on social media and almost all look alike. As a matter of fact, if we are all the same, we may lose what makes us ‘special’…
- Sources: TurkStat (Marriage-divorce data), TurkStat (Internet usage statistics), OECD, EuroNews
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