Or am I bit weird/ cold

[Redtuckshop]

I am a quite confident person. This confidence is misplaced as I get stuff wrong and mess up all the time. I have a sort of irrational lack of fear. I think it's impacting on my friendships and relationships (even with my children) as I don't really understand anxiety or feeling nervous. I just sort of do things, impulsively sometimes.
For example last year I went on a trip. One of my friends accidentally got separate from the group and everyone kept banging on and on about how terrible it was that she wasn't with us and how scared she must be. I just don't get it, it's one trip lasting a couple of ours, she would be fine, chat to new people, see the same sights that we all would. I knew if it was me that I would have enjoyed the trip just the same even if I wasn't with my friends. But doesn't that make me odd? Shouldn't who I'm with make the trip? I like people but I think I can make connections with others quite quickly and would welcome a bit of space, if I didn't want to talk and just wanted to experience it.
My DM remembers on a school trip once, we were delayed and stuck in another country for an extra two days. She recalls the teachers asked me if i wanted to call her and I did, out of obligation, but told her how excited I was to get more time in Italy. She said most of rest of the kids cried.
If I have to drive somewhere I just drive, I don't worry about getting lost. If I want to go somewhere I just book a flight or trip rather than trying to find someone to go with. I'm certain there are other people like me but I live in a very small town and a lot of other women (and yes it is generally women) are more social, unadventurous and some are more anxious. It makes me feel strange and 'distant' like I can't relate without lying to them or feeling like I'm making out I'm superior. I know that it's not a good trait to be fine on your own all the time.

Lacking in certain groups.
🤔How do you mean?

I want to be you! You sound so cool and brave.

I am like this too! However there are certain things I do get really anxious about, but noone would ever know and I've only ever not done one thing due to anxiety. But I'm great in a crisis and love being on my own (and secretly think people who can't be on their own need to seek therapy)

I'd have been excited about a couple more days of a trip as a child and I think most of my friends would too, so to me the tears would be odder.

However I wouldn't enjoy a trip I'd been planning on doing with friends if I was then separated, especially if the others were still together.

I know I can put things aside at time, almost put it in a box to look at later if that makes sense. So something that I might find worrying I can switch off, and revisit later when all's over. It's easier to have nothing to remind me of it, than a phone call or something that brings it back into the forefront of my mind. I think that's a coping strategy from anxiety though.

Maybe its because they actually paid attentuon to the OP and that is literally what the OP said?
This is the empathy we are talkint about, that so many of you on this thread lack....

You sound a lot like me. DH and I were on a biking holiday. On the last day we needed to drive across the country for a ferry. He took a wrong turn at the first roundabout. I wasn’t going to follow, so took the correct turn. We had no Satnavs or phones, so I just bought a map and made my way to the port a few hours away. He eventually met me there, and I had a great day.

People kept saying I must have been scared, but it’s not like I was on the moon!

Ever since I got divorced 5 years ago I do a lot on my own when I'm child-free - hiking trips, camping, city breaks etc. I get told a lot that I'm 'brave'! But the majority women I know are coupled up and kids so they never get the opportunity to do anything on their own - at most they have a 'girls trip' as an opportunity to catch up with friends.

If you're single, child-free, divorced with shared custody etc you have more time to yourself and to be comfortable in your own company and also more opportunity to just do your own thing, or to explore starting to do that. If you have people around you 24/7 and all the responsibilities that go with that, I can see how the idea of going it alone is scary. And I say that as someone who was married to a very controlling person for 15 years and never had the opportunity to do anything alone back then!

I suspect that you’d feel at home in Scandinavia.

If anything I think your friends are a bit odd. Banging on about a NT adult being ‘so scared’ because she was separated from her friends for a short time is really weird. And surely she would have found you if she was really trying to.

As an ex tour manager, can confirm it's extremely difficult to permanently lose someone in a major European city. Even the guy who got Wimbledon and Wembley mixed up made it back to the hotel....eventually 😬

Well, I mean, surely she could have just called them? Asked where they were, and then made her way there. Even if not, I really wouldn’t expect a NT adult who is able to live independently to feel ‘so scared’ that they have been separated from their friends.