Becoming MORE isolated as an adult?
daydreamer84
Veteran

Joined: 8 Jul 2009
Age: 40
Gender: Female
Posts: 5,001
Location: My own little world
I've in a sense grown much more socially isolated. Reason why? I think its because as we get older we're more in charge of our social conduct than ever before.
Even in school, not getting picked for sports teams in gym, or getting ignored.. I was at least somewhat forced to deal with people. Teachers, students if I forgot to bring a pencil to class or something. When I lived at home family would come over and visit and my mom encouraged me to talk to them, was actually decently social with my cousins as far as video games went.
Now I have a girlfriend and being currently unemployed-- she's really my only social contact. We talk about videogames, religion, morality, gossip, etc. Luckily I found someone who likes video games, because aside from "how was your day" I make for very boring conversations in general.
But yeah, I think its way more easy to stay social as a kid than it is an adult, but if I had to choose between then and now, i'd choose the isolation hands down.
That doesn't mean I have any more friends than anyone else though. Dozens of acquaintences but I never see them more than once a week. They get to know each other more on a daily basis but I am always as much of a stranger as I was the first time I met them. I guess I just don't know what to do.
I go out for evening walk thats it and once a week to the mall with my lil son
Right even i dont know what to do with people i always remain a stranger.
What to talk about every day to them without being overbearing?
What have I to offter that would cause them to make an effort to like me?
How to have an impact on their lives enough for them to have time for me?
Lots of questions but no breakthrough as yet. There's something I'm missing but I just don't know how to find it. Every answer I find is really just another question.
Right how often to call (if you call they talk for a min or two and then say a other call is coming, something is cooking on the gas
Right what to talk they dont seem interested
Nothing same here
Crack jokes but being a AS you wont be able to just like me
Even im extrovert, i like to go out, rock n roll, make merry but unfortunately no friends, no acquaintance
its just loneliness and emptiness
people just keep judging.
I tried the geographical cure to break my isolation. At first, I thought I was doing well, but soon ended up just as isolated as before, perhaps even worse because I knew people back in PA. Here in Florida, most people network through religion which leaves me out in the cold, since I don't care for religion. I can't see myself joining a church and all that it entails, in hopes that I will make a few friends. I actually tried joining a religion for that reason a few years ago, and when the novelty wore off, I was just as alone as before. I couldn't become a hypocrite just because I would likely have a lot of company doing so.

I joined 1-2 spiritual groups
Then the spearhead of first group was caught by police for murder etc. i stopped attending that group
Another group they were charging exorbitantly i lost quite a lot of money and ended up with same loneliness and more confusions.
So now no more spiritual groups just me and my isolation
As a young child it was difficult for me to make friends but i normally had one or two other kids I could talk to, who would play with me at recess. In high school again I could keep about 2-3 friends, I got some enjoyment out of talking with them and spending time with them. But as I got into adulthood I found it increasingly stressful to socialize with people and eventually it reached a tipping point where I decided it was not worth it. And when I do try to socialize, have fun, be one of the crowd, I am always slapped with a rude reminder of how bad my social skills are and/ or how off-putting I am to people for some reason.
Once I ventured out to join a conversation 3 neighbors were having. I tried interjecting the same comment 3 or 4 times over-- I thought it was a fairly funny, apropos comment-- but they acted like I was invisible. This happens to me so much in social settings it is ridiculous. It's like my voice is muted to other people.
When I got online I thought that a major obstacle-- my difficulty conversing-- could now be circumvented. I do find it a lot easier to type out my thoughts. But even online I found myself just making an idiot of myself. I think I'm finally coming to the realization that I am not meant to be a social person. I do have a handful of people whom I talk to and briefly socialize with outside of my family but it is extremely limited and I often wonder if even that is worth it. Thankfully I don't feel that lonely. I do get the desire to talk once in a while but I guess that's what message boards are for.
Ya happened to me too.
I cant join in a group they find me peculiar so i keep out
Once i remember a lady in my building taking her son to join a drawing class with her friends son
I asked her can i come she tried avoiding me with excuse that she wanted to get her shoes repaired
so i told her to ask the drawing teacher on my behalf whether my son can join
she said that drawing teacher is quite busy and wont get time to take up any more students
But one other lady asked me to ask this teacher on my own
and now my son attends this class......this avoidance by people makes me feel more and more hurt
as a child i was mute due to voilence at home and now its worse.
if the situation continues then i will stop going out myself i guess
The older I get, the more isolated I get. I'm not happy about it, but this seems to be where my experiences have taken me. I've realized after a while that i'm not a super-enjoyable person to be around. I'm not outgoing, i'm bad with conversations, I'm not interested in the things most other people are interested in (watching sports, going to the movies, bars, clubs, etc, social settings, etc). Also got tired of spending all the money I made for what seemed like shallow friendships.
Looking back I don't know if I ever had a real friend... I think I had one for a short time in high school and he was aspie and that was the last.
Life has gotten way depressing and boring for me for the past few years. I don't see anything getting better for me, just worse, and i'm tired of working full time yet being broke and having no friends :\
if the situation continues then i will stop going out myself i guess
The older I get, the more isolated I get.
+1
I like being around other people, but I find so few that really "get" me. Hence, I don't form close attachments to hardly anyone.
Over the years, I learned to accept this and try to make my peace with it.
I have become more isolated as an adult too because the rules of socialization are much more different than when I was a kid. As a kid people do not think its wierd if you just start talking to them about something you like and then the conversation takes off from there. People can make more time for you as a kid and people do not get so caught up with crap like networking and appearance and stuff like that. I hate being an adult.
_________________
AQ= 41
Your Aspie score: 144 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 66 of 200
I am an Aspie!
Diagnosed as an adult
I'm more isolated as an adult. I think a part of it for me is that I am introverted, not very good at socialising when I try, and have become rather jaded from all the rejection and manipulation. As someone else mentioned, it's tough when you invest that energy into someone you thought was a friend, only to find out they've been laughing behind your back.
The friends I had at school have pretty much drifted away. They have kids, and I don't , so as for many people their kids become their life, I have little in common with them anymore. One of them I tried to keep contact with , though I hadn't had much to do with for years, except through the facebook posts of her with her "cool" friends. One day she turned up on my doorstep because she had problems in her own life and presumably her cool friends were no where to be found. I'd literally run out of sympathy and couldn't care if I tried.
I'd made friends from jobs, or uni but it seems when one of us moves job or area the friendship is likely to dissolve despite my best efforts and their assurances to keep in touch. I think my most enduring friends and aquaintances I have met through my husband.
I can't be bothered putting myself out there any more.
I like Dinosaw's suggestion. Find an activity, church, classroom study, or something that involves meeting with people. Every friend I have met, I met at one of these activities.
I have never had many friends, or even people I felt comfortable to be with for any real length of time. So now I have a different problem. I am getting old. The few friends I have had through out the years are dieing. One of the people I knew was dead almost a whole week, before anyone knew.
I know I don't want to be that guy.
i am becoming more isolated i think because of negative experiences after learning to open up and develop friendships (being taken advantage of and abused emotionally), and i think i am afraid more than before of opening up to people again. i don't know how they will respond, or if they will hurt me again. a year ago a new friend i made wouldn't believe that i thought of myself as socially awkward - i had made so much progress that she couldn't see it! now i barely go out or see anyone.
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