AIBU to think lockdown suits introverted people?

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Its quite suited me, I'm pretty introverted. I like company, one or two people but i feel lost in a big gathering. I don't like parties or forced get togethers. I live my own company. I've got friends but no family to meet up with.

Lockdown hasn't been a million miles away to my usual life.

Don't know if I'm a weirdo or fairly typical?

I’ve enjoyed it, on the whole. I hate socialising so it has been great not having to come up with excuses to get out of things my mother (with whom I don’t get on) is a huge extrovert and is already frothing at the mouth to get a date in diary. She has booked a table for lunch weeks in advance 😩

Working from home and not having get up at the crack of dawn to commute has been great for my mental health - and my bank balance! I’m able to schedule my work day on my own terms as long as the work gets done and I feel much more relaxed.

The only thing I really miss is travel. DH and I usually go away 2-3 times a year and it would be nice to see more than the walls of my house!

Yes, it's a strange one. I consider myself an introvert, love my own company, etc. Lockdown's been hard because the house is like Piccadilly train station, and I need my own space.
I never had a problem saying No to gatherings before. If I didn't want to go, I just said so. Too many times I went to parties and just wanted to go home, so learned to say no.
I like the gym, I like pubs / meals out, but either on my own, or with my OH. Anything else ( like a gym buddy, or making arrangements to meet people ), just feels like too much pressure.
I know the way forward, so that's a positive to come out of Lockdown, etc.

Me too OP. I'm an introvert, live alone and have absolutely loved lockdown. I've kept in touch with my close friends on zoom and through WhatsApp and phone calls so I have not felt at all isolated.

I've been able to do my busy professional job entirely from home, which has been great and I am excelling as never before, now I don't have to block out the twin intrusions and horrors of office life and commuting.

It has made me realise just how much low level stress I have been battling with all my life as an introvert in an extroverted world.

I truly feel re-born - calm, settled, confident and energised. I dread going back to how things were.

Socially I have nt really missed anyone as I don’t have many friends locally and we spend the majority of our non working time as a family in normal times. I don’t do anything socially I don’t want to do and I won’t be starting once we can socialise again. We are really busy as a family though usually out all the time and away a lot of weekends and school holidays and I have found being at home really hard, my kids aren’t interested in freezing muddy walks anymore!

I am an introvert but I have HaTED lockdown! I need my own time by my own but am actually a really social person.
A year alone (I not have family) has affected me really badly

I am an introvert and lockdown life didn't change what I do a lot.
However, as time has gone on I am missing the close interactions I normally have occasionally.
As someone who hates crowds I have been very surprised to realised that I miss seeing strangers just jogging along living their lives.
Its made me re-assess how community is so valuable, and I will be grateful to immerse myself again in 'normal' life, and possibly push my boundaries a bit.

@Words

Me too OP. I'm an introvert, live alone and have absolutely loved lockdown. I've kept in touch with my close friends on zoom and through WhatsApp and phone calls so I have not felt at all isolated.

I've been able to do my busy professional job entirely from home, which has been great and I am excelling as never before, now I don't have to block out the twin intrusions and horrors of office life and commuting.

It has made me realise just how much low level stress I have been battling with all my life as an introvert in an extroverted world.

I truly feel re-born - calm, settled, confident and energised. I dread going back to how things were.

Can really relate to realising how much stress I'd been experiencing, assuming it was something wrong with me, when it was just a bad fit between my natural introversion and my job as a manager in a busy charity. When I changed career and started a more solitary role I felt so relieved! Have never enjoyed work as much as I do now

Lockdown has suited me very well too

I didn't mind lockdown it has it's good points. But what really gets to me is that all my usual haunts are overcrowded. Roll on 12th April...

That’s how I feel too OP.

I didn’t have much of a social life before so I’ve largely been unaffected by lockdown.

Although the kids missed out on dance/sports clubs - i’ve loved not ferrying them about (making small talk) and saved money too. But the home-schooling was very trying at times!

I am very definitely not an introvert, usually accept all invitations and am last to leave a party. And yet, I have settled into lockdown life in a way I'd never have expected. I've enjoyed the slower pace of life, and have never been bored. I'd have thought now we can meet in gardens I'd have been arranging daily meet ups but apart from seeing our adult children, I haven't arranged anything.
Really weird, and no-one is more surprised than I am!

Snap, lockdowns rather suited me. I love to WFH but found I worked twice as hard during last year's lockdown and it nearly finished me off (safeguarding role, really hard when you can't actually see the people you're meant to be safeguarding). I am now looking for a job where I can WFH full time and am aiming to retrain to do so.

It has suited me but I’ve also recognised that left to my own devices I become completely insular and then get depressed. At the start I thought yes, this is perfect I can hide from the world but I now realise that not healthy for me. I do need to force myself to have some social contact.

This is my 22yr old son. He is perfectly happy in his room, studying and gaming online with friends. But I worry about him, it's not healthy to be alone all the time and definitely to stay in and not go out.

I feel so much more reassured that he is ok since he's been out twice this week to meet up with friends and seems energised and happy when he gets back. I think if he didn't force himself to go out he could easily become a hermit.

YANBU.

I know many extroverts have hated lockdown, and really struggled. Good. Now they know how introverts feel in normal times, as we are forced to live our lives being constantly overloaded by contact with people. It’s exhausting and incredibly stressful.

In normal times, extroverts make the rules and dictate social norms, particularly in the workplace. They love zero-privacy open-plan offices, team-building exercises and socialising with colleagues, and they delight in inflicting these things on introverts who hate them. It’s a shame that it has taken a pandemic for us to be able to live quieter, more balanced lives.

Yanbu
It’s been revelatory for me as be slowed right down and see far less people , but do see people I cherish
And I don’t miss it or them

AgeLikeWine

You have just nailed the things I hated about work
Totally

Im massively introverted and love my own company but even i am climbing the walls now desperate to meet up with family and friends for a few drinks and a bbq. Anyone who is social must have had such a miserable time this last year, i cant even begin to know how i'd cope if i needed lots of social interaction.

Yes my husband has loved it and is dreading everything going back to normal.

I'm.introvert but I still crave company and love going shopping, to art galleries, libraries, theatres, being able to go food shopping without wearing a mask and all the other things which have been taken away from us. Maybe homebodies and people with social anxiety and mental health issues yes, but you can be an introvert and still love going out and being around life.

Mixed feelings here. I've missed some things but mainly my children's activities. But in other ways I've been grateful not to have to think of excuses to get out of social engagements. I retired recently and I was thinking it was going to be really difficult to come up with a way of avoiding my own retirement "do". But of course there couldn't be one which was a huge relief. I have missed having the house to myself at times though. But on the whole I don't think it has bothered me as much as more gregarious people.

@AgeLikeWine

YANBU.

I know many extroverts have hated lockdown, and really struggled. Good. Now they know how introverts feel in normal times, as we are forced to live our lives being constantly overloaded by contact with people. It’s exhausting and incredibly stressful.

In normal times, extroverts make the rules and dictate social norms, particularly in the workplace. They love zero-privacy open-plan offices, team-building exercises and socialising with colleagues, and they delight in inflicting these things on introverts who hate them. It’s a shame that it has taken a pandemic for us to be able to live quieter, more balanced lives.

Well said!

Yes indeed AgeLikeWine!
I remember hearing a radio programme last year when someone said with real bitterness & resentment how easy it was to cope with lockdown if you were an introvert. He seemed to have no awareness that life in general favours extroverts and therefore if this happened to work quite well for us, perhaps we were due that little bit of good fortune!

I'm an introvert and have enjoyed lockdown, no hosting , no gatherings etc. I do have friends which I've kept in touch with and I don't mind 1-1s but absolutely hate socializing, groups and crowds and my in-laws!

I am dreading the eventual return to 'what do you mean you're not excited about the 5 weddings, 2 birthday parties and 3 christenings we're invited to over the next 6 months??'.

I've loved having no expectations, socially - it's all well and good saying you find socialising exhausting, and thank god my closest friend is the same, but my wider friendship group expect me at these events (understandably!). And a wedding is my worst nightmare - an entire day of being 'on', loads of people I don't know, small talk a-go-go.

Wish there was a way to say "I'm so honoured you invited me to your wedding/child's christening/birthday night out but I would rather stick pins in my eyes not attend, let's get a brew one day the two of us" without it being rude and weird!

I'm highly introverted and live alone with just a pet. Have been run off my feet with WFH but otherwise, have found this a really restful, relaxing time.

I'm 😬😬😬 about everything reopening because I don't want to have go back 'out there' again.

YADNBU I love my own company and the only thing I’ve missed really is going to the gym and sending quality time with my mum. Working from home for the past year has made me realise how much I don’t miss the office politics and certain people I’d be really happy not seeing ever again .