Meeting people as an adult

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I decided to move it here so that people could focus and expand on this discussion without going off topic.

Yeah, I wish I knew.

School was a write-off, given the amount of bullying, and I clearly needed time to figure myself out (I didn't get diagnosed until almost the end of secondary/high school).

Then college was 99% male, in the field I was most likely to enjoy and/or succeed in, and due to school not working out that took me a number of years to get through, to try and catch up to the level I should've been at if I'd had the entry requirements.

Now I'm finally in work, that's 99% male too. Not that you're supposed to date within work circles, although people clearly still do. But even if I were open to that, there aren't any women to get to know/ask out anyway. Even in terms of platonic friends, I've tried to meet up with colleagues after work, but they all have other commitments. Even if they do come out for a drink, it's maybe one or two, then off home to their own partners/families.

Never had a great deal of friends, but those I did have all ended up moving on, getting busy with work, spending time with their partners, and some of them eventually raising kids, so that's not an option either.

I've tried Meetup groups, with mixed (but mostly lack of) success, there aren't many near me, I have to travel which makes things awkward, and even when I get there I find that it's difficult to get "in" on a conversation. They either seem to know each other already and speak to people they're already familiar with, or they're new but they've managed to find an entry point somehow that I can't see, probably because by the time I've travelled there everybody's already settled into a sub-group of people. They seem to be quite busy and loud, so it's intimidating and (even if you do manage to get into a conversation) difficult to talk comfortably.

I'm quite happy to go to pubs and stuff, where some people meet organically without a pre-defined event, but I can't make myself believe anybody's interested. Between my own rejection sensitivity, past history of being abused, the lack of single people hanging out there like I am, and the institutional warnings towards men about not bothering/harassing/upsetting/offending women, it's like I might as well wear a blindfold with glow in the dark "No Entry" signs on the inside, because that's how it seems society wants me to feel.

If I get very very lucky, with the right amount of booze, in exactly the right circumstance, if people actually invite me to participate or some brief accidental communication happens, that's a huge mood/confidence boost. But that's incredibly rare and completely by chance. If I've done anything to cause it, it's because I'd just drunkenly bumbled my way into a circumstance that I couldn't recreate on purpose if my life depended on it, and it's likely to be a one-off brief thing anyway. I've even considered "saying sorry for having accidentally bumped somebody" to be a "social success" before, because that's an improvement on the nothing that usually happens.

It's frustrating, because I know I can be social, I managed to more or less figure that out, bumbling my way through lucky opportunities to practice with other misfits from back in school (who became my friend group, throughout my late teens and 20s).

But I can't initiate. I need to know it's OK, I need to know that I'm not "that guy" who thinks he's part of the group but everybody else is asking who the hell invited him, or is trying to flirt but is just being weird, because I don't want the embarrassment and I don't want to ruin anybody else's night.

This is why malls were created. Not for capitalism but for people to socialize and hookup. And then Capitalism took over and now the malls are empty, bankrupt, vacant etc.

You could try dating apps.

What kinds of Meetup groups?


Awkward in what way? Do you mean that you are unable to arrive at the beginning of the meeting/event?

It is best to arrive not just on-time but at least 15 to 20 minutes early, maybe even a half hour early, if you can. In my experience, there are often more opportunities to get into one-on-one conversations before a scheduled event than during or afterward.


Given that travel is such an issue, it sounds to me like, in order to have a better life, perhaps you need to move to a more urban area if you possibly can. Is there any possibility that you can do that? Alternatively, is there any possibility that you can get your work schedule changed, if that would make it easier to arrive at these Meetup events at a better time?


How busy and loud people are would likely vary from one Meetup group to another.


Are you still in contact with any of these old friends of yours? If not, is there any possibility you could get back in contact?

If you share any common interests with any of these old friends, perhaps you could invite some of them to attend some relevant Meetup groups together with you? That might be less awkward than attending alone.

Regional social ones. I don't have a great deal of choice, because all of them require that I travel anyway and there don't seem to be any applicable hobby-based ones even within reasonable travel distance.

I find a lot of them to be frustratingly narrow in scope, like religious lesbian groups. I'm neither religious, female, or gay, so that's not much help!


Yes. They're in places I don't know well and which are some time/distance away and they're often on work days.

Which means that there's a minimum turnaround time from getting off work, getting home, unwinding enough to be ready to be social, getting freshened up, getting to a train station, taking the train (which requires that I stick to the rigid schedule of the train service - missing one can mean an extra 30 minute wait, even if I miss it by seconds), getting to the town/city where the event is, getting from its train station to the actual venue...

...and then, once I've managed all that, I'm likely to be stressed from trying to nail the timing of actually getting there and, because I have to also do all that to get home again (or else find myself stranded there, because the last train has gone), I have to clock-watch somewhat to make sure I can rush back to the train station again at the end of the evening.

At best I might have 4 hours of actual socialising time, which sounds fine, but that's if everything goes perfectly; I've left work on time, there's been no delay getting home, I'm quick to switch contexts from work to social, I'm not hanging around eating or getting ready, that I get to the train going to where the social thing is (and that it's not late itself), and that I can get to the venue from the destination train station without making any navigation errors or stalling due to transient "I'll just drop by this place for a moment and get my bearings" type anxiety.

Any kind of delay or less than perfect mood/mental state means that 4 hours can quickly drop to 3 hours or less, which means I've got there later than everybody else so it's already in full swing, I can't take advantage of early arrival/fewer people to ride the wave, and I'm more stressed about timekeeping while I am there and becoming frustrated that I don't have the freedom to be able to just casually show up on a whim like everybody else.


Sadly not. Property prices just keep ratcheting up higher and higher in the UK right now (and have been for years) and I've only recently (the past couple of years) managed to get myself a job. Without going too much into unnecessary detail, that basically means I simply can't afford it. It would double my rent to move somewhere where any of this social stuff actually happens, which unfortunately isn't viable. I'd be struggling to even cover the extra cost and, even if I could, I'd have no money left to actually be social with.


Well, sure, of course. But I mean my experience of the ones I've been to thus far. I don't necessarily mind busy social venues, but they do add to the difficulty of engaging, particularly on top of not having been able to get there before the scheduled start time. Not only do you now have to try to break into existing groups of people, you have to do it when they're already engaged, when it's already loud with conversation, and then there's probably music playing too.

I can cope with music and talk, but only if I know I'm already part of that noise, if I know people there already, I have some point of social reference to work with. It makes it easier to focus on actually having the conversation rather than worrying about not being in one and how difficult it'll be to find or start one.


Not in any meaningful way, unfortunately. We all live far apart, to the extent that doing anything is difficult enough in itself, and they have their own commitments which basically mean I'm persona non grata. After "wife", "child(ren)", and "job", it turns out "that guy I sort of liked years ago but who was a bit of a pain in the backside sometimes, who I'd have to block out time and energy to travel to or host in my home" is quite far down the list of priorities.

I still see one guy, maybe every 2-3 months, which I appreciate, but that's not something I can reasonably rely on as a source of social contact. He too has his own life, it takes time, money, and effort to arrange those meetings (whether he travels or I do), and he has shift work, so he's not necessarily available at convenient times anyway. When he is free, he of course has his own partner and local friends, which I understand are going to be a lot easier and higher priority for him to engage with.

Most of my cousins met their wives/husbands by random chance while they were out. They got to talking with someone they just met & then were dating. It doesn't make sense to me & I imagine that lots of us here would have major problems with that due to us tending to have subpar social skills & us needing to get used to being in an environment & seeing someone there for a bit. However I had an Aspie friend online who met his wife by hooking up with her after a wedding they were both guest at. They had both been drinking a bit & she was a party girl type who felt bad for him. They seemed very incompatible to me. I sure never hooked up with anyone nor gotten a date at any weddings I've been to. I barely even talked with my family while I was there. Perhaps I shoulda drank a bit more but I don't think I'm capable of getting drunk, I get slightly buzzed & a bit more than that & I zone out & then fall asleep.

My parents were set up by a mutual friend while they were in college but they weren't very introverted either but being set up might could work for some introverts. I had a high-school friend who tried to set me up with an online friend of his a year after we graduated(perhaps they had been intimate with each other, I never asked). I was too dense to realize that's what was going on at the time & I also wasn't seeking a relationship then so I kinda missed the opportunity. We did hang out together 1ce offline for a while & she thought I was very quiet but I usually am quiet. I got in a relationship with my 1st girlfriend rite after because we really connected on a forum for a common interest. We quickly became best friends & she told me she liked me. When we broke up the other girl was engaged & we didn't chat much after that. Perhaps if that situation with her happened a year later we woulda became a couple...

I met my other two girlfriends by posting aLOT on this forum.

It seems to me like most introverts meet others online, at work, at school, by going to a place regularly like a library or park, or though family, or through friends they do have.

It frustrates me that I know that's how a lot of "normal" people seem to live their lives, good (well, normal but positive) stuff just happens to them, like it's that easy to "accidentally a relationship" out of nowhere, but that I can't even begin to imagine what that kind of experience is like.

I've known people just like that, people talk about having met their partners that way, and it's just so completely outside of my experience of the world and my place in it. It also means they can't comprehend me when I'm trying to tell them how difficult and terrifying it is, because to them it's just a thing the universe just rewards you with every so often.

I even thought about it watching some YouTube videos of Americans learning about rugby the other day. Normally I only think about it in terms of relationships and maybe friends, but the very idea that somebody could just decide to choose a path in life, voluntarily, and maybe even get support, encouragement, and maybe even contacts through family, so that they become successful and respected in a worldwide sport like that... it's just... I can't even.

It's like being a completely different species. But you know you're not, you know it should have been that way for you as well, but there's no way to switch lanes and get back in the right reality.

I've finally managed to get a job, I'm 20 years late to the party, but I got it, and I'm determined to fix my social and relationship status too.

Unfortunately, there is no degree in "being a competent human being that people enjoy being around and magically relate to", so I can't achieve that the same way (by relentlessly beating my head against a technical subject until I have a piece of paper that says I'm not a lazy idiot). So I still have no idea how. But, damnit, I'm not going out like that.