A BBC news headline caught my attention in March where the Bishop of Modena called on Italians to give up text messaging for Lent. A tough demand, as anyone who has visited Italy knows that mobile phones have become a way of life, the way eating, drinking, and breathing is. I toyed with the idea but as a busy mum, always on the move, I made excuses to myself (and God) and decided to give up chocolate for Lent again (God yawns). As we drew nearer to Holy Week good old Catholic guilt set in, I hadn’t sacrificed enough. Why not try the text veto for Easter weekend? Or go further and give up the internet too! I had an ulterior motive in doing this. Feeling a little frazzled by overloading my diary with mum meetings, baby outings and family get-togethers, I wanted an excuse to be incommunicado for a few days.

After sending a variety of ‘out of office’ style messages to my social media posse and direct messages to a select few ‘proper’ friends ‘sorry, bonding with God and family this weekend, see you Monday’, I switched off the computer and deactivated e-mail on the iPhone.

The next morning my fingers were already twitching. While taking a walk through Pavilion Gardens I resisted the urge to Tweet about the beautiful busker offering renditions of Oasis songs. My brain had moved my hands into action in a flash. They were on the verge of reaching into my bag for my phone when I silently screamed inside my head. Why did I have this urge to tell everyone what I was doing all the time?

It started harmless enough, customising my news feed, tweeting hot Blog links but had turned into an appetite for social popularity in a virtual world. Later, I had text message withdrawal panic. A friend was 10 minutes late to meet me and Little L for afternoon tea. She had diligently observed my text veto, so I sat there nervously tapping my leg and glancing at my watch. How ridiculous? Again, I pulled myself into line, sat Little L on my knee and we watched the dolphin fountain together.

From that point on, I calmed down. My weekend unfolded into a sequence of uninterrupted experiences with the real world. Monday was ‘E-Day’ - checking the Yahoo inbox. There were 79 unread e-mails. 27 were Facebook and Twitter notifications. The rest were adverts from websites I had purchased something from and forgotten to tick or un-tick a box. Only 7 e-mails were from real people about real-life subjects? I was dumbfounded when I realised I’m spending a great deal of time checking and deleting 90% of my e-mail traffic.

The truth is, in worrying that baby and domesticity wouldn’t be mentally challenging enough for me I had busied myself with information that added no value to my life. The Easter cyber fast had helped me re-discover quality of information not quantity and that is why I shall be doing it every month from now on.