Instagram vs Reality: Why I Faked A Perfect Relationship While My Life Was In Hell

On Instagram, my relationship looked perfect.

There was us in Paris, in Athens, in New York. Out at another Michelin-starred restaurant. Smiling with our arms around each other on a mountain in Whistler. Celebrating his fortieth in a Scottish castle. There was me flashing my engagement ring, looking overjoyed.

But the reality was far from what I curated for Instagram. Each of those amazing trips had involved tears, fights, storming off, screaming.

I’d often not been able to eat my food at the fancy restaurant because I was crying, and he’d left me alone most of the week in Whistler while he went off with friends and abandoned me on the nursery slopes.

In truth my relationship was hell, with a partner who treated me with contempt, coldness, and cruelty. When it ended after three years, I was in bits, and had to find a way to put myself back together. I’d been treated for years like I was worthless, by someone who said I was the love of their life, and it had broken me.

So why did social media not reflect any of this chaos?

I’d never thought of myself as a dishonest person, but that’s what I was doing. I was creating an image of a perfect life, where I was loved and cared for, and where I actually enjoyed the expensive and exotic things we got up to, our multiple trips and bougie lifestyle.

People made jokes to me all the time about how I was always on holiday, and I’d just smile. It was true we went away a lot. But we’d always have at least one terrible row and I’d always cry a lot. Even as we got engaged and moved towards a picture-perfect wedding, things were getting worse and worse. My hair started to fall out from stress, and I couldn’t sleep.

Why didn’t I tell the truth? Partly I wasn’t telling the truth to anyone, including myself – if I’d admitted how bad things were, I would have had to leave him and call off the wedding, and I wasn’t prepared to do that.

When we fought, sometimes he would accuse me of just staying because I didn’t want to admit publicly to failure. I would hotly contest that – I loved him deeply – but perhaps he was right in a way.

Of course I didn’t want to contradict all the posts I had made about how happy we were. I had sunk a lot in creating a beautiful-looking life, and social media was a big part of that. He did it too, often posting about the wonderful time we’d had together, when I knew that wasn’t true at all. It’s actually a trend I have noticed, that the worse couples are getting on, the more vocal they are on social media about their love.

I’d even made jokes about how a loved-up post generally means divorce is imminent, but I closed my eyes to it when it happened to me. We aren’t always ready to face the truth.

It’s also the unspoken agreement we all made when social media came into our lives – we would only show a filtered, buffed, cropped version of reality. Not the sad and difficult and boring days, when we hate our partners and ourselves, when we feel ugly and like we’re failing. I worry that this is putting people under intolerable pressure.

With the clever use of angles, filters, and now AI, what we see online is often very far from the truth, manipulated and carefully chosen narratives that don’t reflect real life at all. But when we look at other people’s posts, we forget that, and feel bad. We think that we also need to have a flat stomach and cute kids and loving partner and very clean home (I can’t be the only person who’s gone down CleanTok rabbit holes).

So we feel inadequate, and spend money or download a dating app or book another holiday, and make some posts so people back home can see how happy we are, and the cycle continues.

One thing I began to do after my relationship fell apart was tell the truth. When people asked me, even casually, ‘how are you?’, I would give a real answer. This led to some amazing conversations, and finding out new things about people I’d known for years, plus new friendships and deepened connections.

Although I still post on social media, I try to be honest if I’m not having a good day, if I’m tired or sick or downhearted. I think this makes the happy posts all that more truthful, and I really value it if someone can be vulnerable and authentic online.

I try to do the same. It’s not always sunsets and meals out and clinked glasses of wine, but it is real.

I never want to go back to faking my life online – what I’ve learned is it only makes unhappiness worse to slap a nice filter on it.

Claire McGowan’s new novel The Other Couple explores what happens when the facade of a ‘perfect’ marriage finally shatters on a luxury holiday – you can get your hands on it here.