Feeling like I'm being left behind

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I've seen photos on social media of people I knew or recognise from school or college, now with families of their own. Even my sister who is 28 is a mother now and I feel like the only one still with no partner and still lives at home and indulges in the hobbies and interests I've been into since being a kid. I know this will sound ridiculous but I also seem to think that if I'd gone to bars and other social gatherings and stuff then maybe I wouldn't be in this situation now. As I said I know this is ridiculous because you don't always find your potential partner in a bar as it is not always the case but that is how it feels.

I get jealous of women my age having babies, especially those who I'd never imagined would become a parent. I used to be best friends with this girl who was a wimp like me, like was scared of hospitals and avoided anything that might give her physical pain, and she was very anxious about everything, just like me. But now she's just had a baby, and a few months ago she had posted a photo of the unborn baby with a caption saying "after years of trying I've finally fallen! We're so happy!" If I was pregnant I would be an absolute nervous wreck, scared of anything that could possibly go wrong, scared of pain, scared of morning sickness, scared of giving birth because of the enormous amount of pain you get, it all makes me cross my legs tightly and cringe. Obviously not every woman feels as scared as me of pregnancy because if they did then the human race would have died out thousands of years ago. So most women obviously don't feel the same anxieties I feel about pregnancy. But because of my high anxiety and sensitivity to pain, I will have to go through life never having a baby of my own. I wish more women felt like me so I wouldn't feel so alone. Or I wish I was a guy so that I can have a baby (without adopting) without having to go through all that pregnancy and pain. It's not fair. Why do women have to go through so much? All men have to do is put the baby in there and carry on with their lives, feeling excited for when their baby arrives.

Many people (including myself) don't really start "living life" until at least their 30s.

Many people (not including myself) eventually catch up to their peers.

It seems to be a common belief among a lot of people on autism sites that life ends at 30, that from 30 onwards you're old and unattractive and too old to do anything - even though you're not even halfway through your life yet and women are nowhere near the menopause yet.

So sometimes I feel really old when I read that and the people in their 40s+ probably feel unworthy of any quality of life. Please don't make everybody over the age of 30 feel elderly. We are not elderly. Maybe some 50-year-olds might think that (although they're not old yet), but definitely not at 30.

I was "left ahead" while I was in school.

The teacher, through her disdain for me, allowed the kids "left behind" me to catch up.

How I got over this one is that all those people are not me, they don't have my life nor it's conditions. I do not want to be these people despite how easy it looks for or maybe desiring this or that about their situation. Their progress is not my progress and our life paths are completely different. I look at he rest of what they have opposed to maybe the one or two things I do want and I go "Wait I don't care about any of this at all!" and move on. Quitting big social media or using it only when you have to do is also a good idea, it's just noise most of the time. At most I use Instagram in the break room for entertaining content and some updates on things, otherwise I don't care what's going on there. It's an emotional game and you're letting it manipulate you. I look back and I couldn't have been what many others grew up to be anyway, not even in the sense of disability wholly but desire for it. That just isn't me and they don't have what I want, I had to accept myself and continue to heal myself. This is a long path that lasts a lifetime and it goes in many directions.

It also helps to always be discovering more and digging deeper into your own path, there is infinite depth to all perception and action. Go deep enough and you won't even miss what you thought you did and realize what you actually and want and learn a lot more about yourself. When you look into a perspective that's making you miserable you're only going to get more of it since this goes both ways. The concept of eternity is your friend. Big or small things, it doesn't matter. Just keep going even if something looks bleak if it's the path you feel you should be going down, there's a component of being a little more fearless here too. It gets very dark sometimes, sometimes what I don't have causes me great pain and longing but for what there is no solution I can't do anything about. I can continue to do with what I do have though and make more from it. The real problem would be just stopping and drowning in my own sorrow when there are other things to do.

my best life ever has been since diagnosis at age 68, finding self understanding meant a lot.
I could change things when I learned what was hardest for me.

I always felt "behind" in many things, but then I realized that as many people who were "ahead of me". there were also that many or more "behind" me as well.

That helped a lot. In almost every thing about life, there will be others better off and others who are not as well off.
Do what is right for you, right where you are today. Nobody knows you better. Sending best wishes.