Was socializing easier as a kid or is it easier as an adult?

Post Reply New Topic

Adult
I can choose who to interact with and have a say in things now. I had no say in what I was allowed to do or what people were allowed to do to me. As a child everyone was overly critical of me and everything I did. As an adult, I can tell them to f**k the hell off.

easier as a kid though even then i didn't say much and was usually in the fog of it all. got overly deluded in college due to how stressful socialising was becoming, the only time i talked then was when i was talking about conspiracy theories but came to my attention i was pushing people away by doing that. now my mind constantly loops social events and i tend too dissect/try to translate everything thats been said to me in my mind and am overly weary of what i say to others. hopefully it will get easier as an adult.

It has definitely become easier as an adult to socialize as compared to being a timid kid; as I've always related better to thoughtful adults than (to seemingly often, and literally) thoughtless kids my own age.

While becoming older and wiser, I often was encouraged to, and eventually understood the value of picking-up social cues (in the world at large) by osmosis.

As an adult, who we chose to (or not chose to) interact with is a choice.

for me it was easier when i was a young kid (i was super outgoing bc lack of boundaries) but as I got older social rules started becoming apparent to people but I never caught on, so it's become more difficult as I've gotten older.

Socializing with others has always been easy.

Getting them to socialize with me, however, is an ongoing challenge.

I feel this way too.

As a young child I was oblivious most of the time and even though my peers didn't like me, I was always polite and tried hard to fit in. In my teens and young adulthood I was very shy and didn't want to associate with my peers because I just couldn't relate to them. I didn't want to put myself in danger by getting drunk, going to nightclubs and hanging around with males.

Now I'm older, even though I'd sometimes like to have the opportunity to get dressed up and socialise, I'm too stuck in my ways these days and I've never been able to make friends as an adult so I'm not sure how I'd start now. Most people my age already have established friendship groups and families so that makes it more difficult, and people also expect you to be more socially proficient when you are older.

As an adult definitely

I feel like it's kind of a toss up for me. I was often painfully shy as a kid so making friends and socializing was pretty difficult. On the other hand I feel like there were more clear lines in some ways. Like you could go sit on a swing next to a kid you don't know and before you know it you're giggling with them and trying to get yourself higher and going faster than them. I don't feel like there is that kind of open ease to interaction in adulthood.

Adulthood tends to be more isolating for me in general but I have better skills(also masking abilities) in terms of social conduct and appearing like anyone else. There's like more rules and boundaries now, or maybe I'm just more aware of them, either way I do have a difficult time trying to figure out there those things are. As I kid that sort of thing wasn't quite so complicated. You could say something kind of off color and it would be thought of as weird, quirky or even cute but as an adult you're a potential nutcase.

So I'm not really sure, I want to say it was maybe a bit easier as a kid, simply because I did have some friends in my young life, where now... not much.

It's a complicated answer really.

I had more of an interest in socializing as a kid but I was terrible at it and would get alienated or mocked.

I have less of an interest in it now but when I do I can better understand the expectations other individuals carry in various situations.

In a certain sense, I'm less obnoxious but also less concerned in getting to know you to begin with.

It's easier now than before, now that I have less of a need for acceptance. Either they do or they don't, doesn't matter as much now. Results, however, never seen to change.

Definitely easier as a kid. I still feel like a kid socializing with adults, even now that I am an adult. People are boring, lack depth, aggressive, impatient, and focused on a singular long term goal. The average hobby is being on a couch and staring at a boring show for hours and hours, sleep at 8 PM, waking at 6 AM. Living in some sort of dark dystopian loop.

Of course I don't really spend much time around children, but when I was that age my friendships were often genuine. People had more curiosity and we had deeper conversations. No surface-level forced social normative bs where we force ourselves to sit and talk about jobs, politics, or the weather. We weren't suffocated in social norms and expectations, the entire world was not on our back telling us how we should see something, etc. etc.

I also feel like it was easier as a kid (before the age of 12). I never had to make any friends... They were sort of just handed to me. In kindergarten it was parents and teachers who made kids friends with each other, at least that's how it was for me. I even had a lot of kids who wanted to play with me. Though, I lost touch with most of those kids eventually since I suck at initiating social things. I remember mom telling me that I had to make an effort to call my friends and ask to play with them, because otherwise they would get bored and stop asking me to play. Then when they did stop calling me, I seriously couldn't have cared less. Despite this, I still had four long term friends from kindergarten up to around age 12. Three of them were in my class at school and we all (except one girl) had known each other since we were two years old pretty much. The other one was my absolute best friend and she was a year younger than me. Given that I had so many friends growing up, even though I only really felt a real connection with one of them, makes me doubt my diagnosis. Mustn't I have had pretty good social skills for so many kids to want to be my friend? I know I did take things literally sometimes and I made a few social errors, but still.

Then when I turned 12 and my class and another class was put together as a whole new class, things changed. My former three friends in my class turned against me and got some people from the other class to join them as well. I was bullied for 1,5 years and the one who started it all later said to me that it was because of something I had done (which I don't remember now what it was). From there it just got worse, because the bullying wasn't the worst part. Somehow I ended up being friends with two of the girls who were the worst bullies and even though they didn't bully me anymore, they didn't treat me very well. I remember they used to tease me, but as a joke (I think?? I still can't tell if they really were teasing me or if I just didn't get the jokes). This point in time was also when I started meeting new people (through my "friends") and I realised how bad I was at socialising with people I didn't know well. I just had no clue what to say and felt like an outsider, watching the foolish teenagers interact. It was a mystery to me how they did it.

Then when I finally got rid of them when I started high school at 16 years old (that's when it starts in my country), I managed to make a new friend the first day. Idk what it was, but I was drawn to her and I felt like she would understand me and not judge me. One of the first things I said was "I hate my former class" and she felt the same way, so we could relate to each other. Then we became friends with another girl in our class eventually. Now several years later I know that I actually had a crush on the first girl... When that crush sort of faded when she got a boyfriend, I stopped feeling this strong connection unfortunately. I'm still friends with these two girls and they are my only friends. I don't want any more though, since that's too much work for me and I love my alone time.

When it comes to socialising today it's still hard to know what to say when talking to people I don't really know that well and it stresses me out. A few months ago I was at my friend's birthday party and it wasn't fun at all. I tried to "mingle" with people, but I had no clue what to say most of the time and I got so tired. I don't feel like small talk comes naturally to me and the whole greeting and saying goodbye thing isn't natural to me either. Do we hug? Do I just say hi and smile? Should we shake hands? I always just let the other people take the initiative and I follow their lead and pretend that I know what I'm doing lol.

I relate to what you said about hiding behind your mom as a kid. Not that I literally hid behind my mom (as far a I know), but I remember that I always felt that I needed my mom (or at least my little brother or someone) by my side. Mom had to prompt me to say hi and thank you and all that and she still does... I know that when my grandma on mom's side opens the door I'll hug her immediately, but if there are other relatives there I don't really know what to do and just wait for instructions haha. This feeling that I have to have someone with me also goes for any other social situation, I've realised. I love being alone when I'm not around other people, but when I'm in public and have to interact with other people I feel the need to have someone with me so I can follow whatever they do. Otherwise I feel lost and extremely anxious.