Social Media Burn-Out

In light of our recently planned hiatus from Instagram, we have decided to share some insight from a deeply personal perspective.

Jennifer has poured her entire heart and soul into Jennuine Pet Services from day one. We cannot thank Brownyn of Dolce’s Legacy enough for constantly being a source of emotional support and sharing so much knowledge with us as we would certainly not be here today to tell this very personal story if it weren’t for her pushing Jennifer to “do the damn thing” LOL.

All of this fear and doubt stems from years of domestic abuse. We’re not sharing this information for pity, but for clarity. Jennifer also struggled with severe alcoholism and addiction for many years before becoming a mother and learning all the beauty of a holistic lifestyle for herself and her family. She has been clean, sober AND quit smoking for a total of 6 years now. She has made amazing progress in her life and she is blessed to be alive and healthy with a family who has supported her unconditionally.

Now, when you’ve been psychologically traumatized for years on end by someone you were (at the time) totally in love with, it changes you. Every step you make seems like a mistake, every choice is not good enough. Constantly being told to shut up, you’ll never amount to anything and you don’t know what you’re talking about has a profound effect on your self confidence in daily life.

All that aside, Jennifer wasn’t sure she could manage a business. She’d never tried. She was nervous, excited and eager to instill the same passion for holistic health and wellness for pets that she had learned and became obsessed with over the years that passed since she removed her abuser from her life. All while raising her son on her own who was diagnosed with high functioning autism at barely 2.5 years old. That in itself has been a battle and an ongoing learning experience.

Jennifer was diagnosed with ADHD at a very young age and has always found it difficult to make and keep friends because she’s “too much” or too loud and too forceful with information or expressions.

Now, to explain our incredibly necessary leave of absence from social media. Jennifer admittedly became even more obsessed with trying to “go viral” than she’d like to admit. She was neglecting her daily life to spend hours on creating free guides, keep up with reels and trending ideas, posts, infographics, replying to comments and trying to build meaningful connections with people and their pets in the community. She spent a little over $1,200 on ads, follow trains and other marketing scams that ultimately left her more stressed and no further ahead than before.

Having a group of likeminded people who would listen to her and who cared about the same things as her was the most uplifting and inspiring experience she has had in a very long time. Social media was consuming her life and causing her to neglect her mental health, her family and other responsibilities. She abruptly made the decision to bow out and take a much needed break because it was consuming her thoughts day and night… “What if they don't actually like me?, they probably think I'm just annoying, she’s just copying others to get ahead, she’s a fake, she doesn't even have high quality videos” these are just some of the thoughts that were constantly floating around in her head all day and night which ultimately lead to laying awake “doom scrolling” trying to interact with as many people as possible and becoming an unhealthy addiction. Her sleep was profoundly affected due to the late night exposure to blue light from her screen among other unfortunate side effects of becoming totally immersed in an online world.

Some people may read this post and laugh. Some people might think a lot of things. All that matters right now is taking a step back, healing the broken pieces of herself that she thought were mended and building a healthy routine in her life that will allow more time and space for content creation in the future. We have always and will continue to be “Jennuine” with our friends, followers and clients because we believe that they deserve the transparency.

We are forever grateful for the support and kind words from everyone that’s reached out to push us to keep going and never give up. These are the people who understand how dedicated we have been to making this business a reality. We cannot thank you enough for continuing to support us and giving us this much needed time to rest and regroup before rising up from these ashes like the phoenix Jennifer has tattooed on her calf which says “Face Everything And Rise”… Because fear has two meanings… Forget Everything And Run OR Face Everything And Rise. Bowing out from Instagram to focus on our mental health is the most difficult decision we’ve had to make to date for our business because many of our followers rely on and enjoy our content and we promise to come back when we’re ready!