Loneliness Megathread

[tooBadTooLate]

It's really demanding for me to keep in touch with people who I can't get close to emotionally—and that applies to people whose contacts I've gotten over the years. Just sitting in there, probably gathering digital dust in my phone. I remember calling someone whom I got their phone number the day before, only for it not to go through. What a shame. He said that I was a very interesting person to talk to on that day. Sure, I bet he was busy at the time, but God damn it there goes a chance for someone I might've formed a decent bond with.

 

[fromange]

I told a few people about my thoughts. Their responses sucked so I stopped. I have a few friends but my ex was my best friend. Family, never again since last time I opened up years ago. I haven't told anyone about my thoughts from the depressive episode I'm currently in. I don't want to talk to a therapist because they either disappoint or overreact. Are they gonna cure my ADHD? Get me a job? Keep me that job? Get someone to love me? Have that person stay? Yeah don't think so. So I need to just make up my mind. Either do it or shut up about it.
Fuck "you're not alone." Yes I am.

 

[ToTheEgress]

I had to leave the university town I've lived in for the last 4 years, where I had some kind of social life for basically the first time in my life. Now everything hurts I hate living in my hometown and I feel like chances are slim that I'll be able to leave.

 

[KenDuh]

I write messages to people that won't answer, but I wait believing that maybe this time they'll do, they haven't blocked me nor told me anything at all, just silence. I once told them that I hated silence, the brain doesn't know what's going on and creates the worst stuff. I arrive home just to sleep, is no good that I check messages, nobody will message either way. I'm losing the need to talk, I may forget how to and remain silent.

 

[android]

I write messages to people that won't answer, but I wait believing that maybe this time they'll do, they haven't blocked me nor told me anything at all, just silence. I once told them that I hated silence, the brain doesn't know what's going on and creates the worst stuff. I arrive home just to sleep, is no good that I check messages, nobody will message either way. I'm losing the need to talk, I may forget how to and remain silent.

Losing the need to talk is key. I really believe that it is only in silence that we can stop suffering. It requires a deep surrender to silence. No more noise; not even parasocial relationships like forums, YouTube or podcasts.

The mind is an incredibly powerful thing. If you truly want to live, you can carve a world out for yourself in your head that is habitable for you. In fact, the world that you and I think we live in, is just an artifact of our own minds.

This is all well in theory. But of course you might complain:

1. I do not "enjoy" life for xyz reason.
2. I do not want to exit because abc reason.

In other words these complaints translate to:

1. I am not content with the current world that I have built in my mind.
2. I want to live. (Otherwise I'd be gone already.)

It's hard for me to admit #2, but I think it's true, and every time I get close to ctb I realise that I actually want to live. Perhaps it's biological.

The hardest thing about "worldbuilding" is that we all have to agree to this one stupid reality. We have to wake up, talk to people (e.g. parents), go participate in institutions (democracy, school, and so on). Most of us are all forced to connect into the "real world", the one that brings us so much pain.


IF You are lucky enough to be truly alone, then you are blessed. It is not a surprise that mystics of the past all advocated for things like meditation, disappearing into caces or gardens where they were surrounded by no-one. If you truly are alone, try to disconnect. Build your own world. Perhaps it is your loneliness that will truly set you free.

 

[Dejected 55]

I write messages to people that won't answer, but I wait believing that maybe this time they'll do, they haven't blocked me nor told me anything at all, just silence. I once told them that I hated silence, the brain doesn't know what's going on and creates the worst stuff. I arrive home just to sleep, is no good that I check messages, nobody will message either way. I'm losing the need to talk, I may forget how to and remain silent.

I don't understand this either... how someone will apparently not want to talk with you, but does not block you and may or may not be reading what you send. Sometimes it seems like they must... but still they never respond so you are only guessing. I don't understand why people can't just tell you how they feel, and kick you away honestly... then block you if they must... but give the courtesy of telling you they don't want to be in your life before going silent.

I've always told people how I felt... if I had a problem with them... if I no longer wanted to communicate. I don't leave people hanging like that. It is cruel and painful.

 

[worldsworsthedonist]

My background is boring and typical. I have not had a friend since I graduated from high school a decade ago. I have maintained a self-destructive pattern of socially avoidant behavior all this time. I make evident to my peers that I intend only to interact on a professional basis. At least I am on good terms with my immediate family, but we are not close. I love my brother more than anything in the world, yet I keep him at arms length. I self-narcotize by watching or listening to asmr, vtubers, youtube for >10 hours a day so almost always there is some familiar stranger's voice in my ears. By now I mostly listen to the same things over and over. Needless to say I have no love life. I have never tried to form an intimate relationship.

I remember at the very moment of my high school graduation it seemed to be revealed to me in a sudden that I would never speak to my former classmates again, like a bell ringing in my ear. I thought that was what I sensed, and it felt refreshing to clear them away.

I affect an icy formality in academic or professional settings. Nowhere have I appeared stuffier than at university.

I feel most alone in the company of my extended family.

The romance of alcoholism is too heavily tempered by risk aversion. At least I managed to pick up cigarettes.

Wonder if there's anything to the thought that, like concert pianists or sportsmen, to become an excellent romantic partner requires significant dedication and practice in one's youth. Probably wrong.

 

[turkishcoffee77]

My loneliness stems from a 27 year old marriage & relationship that has become stale. A lot of bitter resentments from a differing cultural ideology I've struggled to set right. It has estranged my remaining biological family away from me. I'm stuck in the abyss living with hoarding in-laws and a wife of whom I no longer love. Instead, I'm forced to just be 'there' and take care of domestics and buffer fights between my daughter and wife. After work I return to a house of disarray and strangeness which doesn't feel like a home to me anymore. I'm now starting to dissociate my situation onto my other relationships which just 'exist' out of necessity rather than genuity. Apathy is starting to take hold.

In spite of the mounting apathy, it still hurts. I've been a depressive since my early 20s when I first tried to ctb. My then gf (now wife) knew about it but simply went about the business of building her life around me. I'm expected to 'love' her, and be a 'husband' for her sake. When my SI comes up in a conversation, she simply tells me to be quiet and get professional help. Gaslighting and guilt are no exceptions.

It's now become so bad that I've started to set plans into motion, but not on an impulsive level like in my youth. I hurt so much that preparations are unbearably slow, but I don't want to blow it this time. In the end it'll all be worth it, and I'll finally be at peace.

 

[suicidallysane]

I hate when I don't have anyone to talk to. I feel so alone and uncared for. It's really embarrassing being this needy as an adult

 

[whitetaildeer]

I hate being a widow. There is no one who could possibly fill the void of my late beloved, and it feels so painfully selfish each time I consider it. She is/was all I really had.

 

[soullessnes]

Right now, the only person I have is my mom but her health is deteriorating and she is older. Can't imagine what life will be when I lose her. She helps me with a lot of things. I won't be able to cope for sure

 

[badtoad12314]

I cut off my parents and half of my family because of what my parents did to me. I cut off my friends that i knew for years because of guilt and feeling like a monster after i blamed myself for a partner attempting suicide. they dont want to talk to me anymore because i do it alot when i feel so guilty for something i did or the way i act. perhaps this event was the last straw.

 

[Liwujin]

I tried to reach out to my best friend for help or at least a shoulder to cry on, I confessed I was planning to cbt but it just turned awkward and we haven't spoken about it since then. I tried to tell my mother as well but I just couldn't look her in the eyes and tell her I felt miserable as she listed all the reasons why I shouldn't feel that way. I feel like there is a wall between me and the rest of the world I just can't go past.

 

[SoverignDreamer97]

So be it.

1. "You cannot please everyone; control the things you can control." ~Suncha Ferreira (Victus Group)/Mark 8:36, Matthew 13:12

2. The grass withers, the flowers fade, because the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God stands forever. (Isaiah 40:7-8)

3. The world hates liabilities, and would rather they not exist, as much as the rules dictate that all life is inherently valuable. (Proverbs 25:17)

• Even in a community of liabilities, there is no place for a liability. (John 15:18)

Therefore, as much as I desire to live, and that a world without me would be awfully dull and grey, this isn't up to me; if I die, I die; though my father, mother, and the whole world forsake me, the Lord will bring me up. (Esther 4:11, Psalm 27:10)

 

[foreverandever]

I've never been good at making friends, socializing, and especially dating. I've always felt like a freak who had to work twice as hard just to come off as normal. Add to that a growing list of complexes, failures, and insecurities, and over the years I've just gotten worse and worse.

Despite that, I've always had at least a few good friends at every point in my life. Wonderful people who forced me to open up and let them in. They're honestly one of the only reasons I'm still here. But, I don't feel like I can really, fully trust them. Still. I'm terrified of what they'd think if they knew the things I think. If they knew how worthless I really am. I'm sure they'd end up abandoning me like many of my old friends did.

So, I keep them at length. Which keeps me feeling extremely lonely despite not being so physically. In addition are my dating problems. I've never had a girlfriend, I've never even kissed anyone. I've always been too awkward and stupid to figure it all out. Yet, my deepest desire is still to be a husband and father. I've tried time and again to kill that want. To convince myself that I don't need it. Yet, it persists. I feel as though nothing will ever mean anything to me without it. Which I know is wrong. I shouldn't tie my happiness to external factors... Blah, blah, blah.

I've tried changing, improving, working on things, but it's apparently pointless. I'm just fundamentally wrong in every way. So, here I am, trying once again to give up on it all. I hope it works this time.

 

[breathingblues]

I hate being a widow. There is no one who could possibly fill the void of my late beloved, and it feels so painfully selfish each time I consider it. She is/was all I really had.

Horrible sounding suggestion, but she'd probably want you to be happy. Replacing her is cruelish and not something that will help that much, but being alone gives more suffering.