After a long hard day involving two congenital heart surgeries, I returned home late in the evening. My little girl was on the phone with her cousin.

A few minutes later, I found her in tears!

Some comforting and TLC brought out the reason. Her cousin had refused to talk with her, and had handed over the phone to her mum. She felt rejected - and hurt.

Yes, rejection hurts.

As we discussed her feelings and how to deal with them, over a late dinner, I got better insight into something that had happened earlier in the day with a ’social media expert’ (who will remain unnamed).

I had followed her posts on Twitter - and based on some interaction, decided it probably wasn’t someone I wanted to know better. So I ‘un-followed’ (Twitter lets you do this easily, with one click on a button).

I forgot all about it - until an email popped into my inbox a few hours later. The message accused me of being ‘immature’ because I broke off contact following a disagreement - and offered to ‘enlighten me’ with more facts.

It was amusing - and mildly irritating.

In a huff, I drafted out an (appropriately) rude and sarcastic reply - but didn’t send it until much later, and after toning it down quite a bit (Lesson: do NOT send email in a fit of negative emotion… ever!)

But from what happened to my little girl, I could understand what was happening to this ‘big girl’.

She perceived my action as ‘rejection’.

And rejection hurts.

In a technology-driven world, it’s easy to forget that at the other end of an email, or a forum post, or a private message, or a Twitter tweet, there sits a fellow human being.

A human being who thinks, dreams and FEELS - just like you do.

And a thoughtless, uncaring action can hurt that person.

Even if you don’t realize it.

Do you cry on social media?

Do you make others cry?