Sometimes being an introvert is exhausting?

[FuckOffTom]

I do feel like it’s me that’s being unreasonable here. But I don’t know how to change it!
I have some wonderful friends. But sometimes, I find listening to them talk about their lives absolutely exhausting.
I know how lucky I am to have these people - they are amazing and supportive but sometimes, when they call me or visit me I find myself feeling absolutely exhausted listening to their stories. It’s not their fault, they are just trying to ‘catch up’ with me. But they’re telling me in detail about a cupboard they’ve cleared out, or about a visit their dogs had to the vets, or a friend of a friend (whom I have never met) and her issue with her knees and I feel overwhelmed and exasperated listening to it. I just want to be left alone sometimes and not be talked at.
Don’t get me wrong, if the conversation is a bit deeper, or if a friend really needs my support or we are talking about interesting ideas then I love a good conversation.
Do a lot of people experience this and how do I deal with it? Do I carry on feigning interest??

Sounds like you find your friends boring. Nothing to do with you being an introvert.

Nobody is interesting in hearing about people cleaning out their cupboards. Nowt to to with being an introvert.

I just feel really guilty about it sometimes though! Surely it’s my fault for being bored? They’re just trying to connect with me, right?

This.

I am an introvert. I still find my friends’ conversation fascinating, because I don’t choose to have in my life people who bang on about their cupboards, or vet visits.

Why would it be your fault? No one is interested in anyone’s cupboards!

Like others have said, it's not about being an introvert. When people are talking "at" you, as if you're a wall, droning on about pointless shite you have no interest in, it's absolutely torturous. I feel the same way.

Move the subject on to more interesting topics other than spring cleaning

I have friends who talk about books, travel or TV. That's not intended to be smug. I just wouldn't be keen on listening to stuff about cupboards and other people's knees, and I am not an introvert.

I work with someone who goes on and on and on about dramas happening within her extended family. Her lack of awareness of how little I care is astonishing. I don't know these people, I am never going to know them, and after all of the shit I've heard about them, I will run in the opposite direction if they are ever anywhere near me. I have made avoiding her my version on an Olympic sport.

Yes, it’s not as though extroverts are people who can’t get enough of knee cartilage or ‘old condiments I found at the back of the kitchen cabinets’ conversations!

Surely anyone with a pulse knows no one is interested in their cupboards? I figured that was why there was a Housekeeping board on here, so that people could get that stuff off their chests without alienating their actual friends.

Unless we're talking skeletons in cupboards then maybe it's more interesting!

I find it exhausting people blaming all their anxieties and social dysfunction on being an "introvert". It's become a catch-all, get out of jail free card for people who are shy, anxious, grumpy, misanthropic, sociopathic have shit friends or hate their partners.

You may or may not be an introvert but you're bored and frustrated because your friends are boring. Not because you're an introvert.

Can we please reclaim the word "introvert" from this constant misuse?

Start a campaign and I will bring a banner. I thought the continual misuse of ‘narcissist’ to mean ‘someone I don’t like’ was maddening enough, but the equation of misanthropy, shyness, poor social skills etc etc with ‘introversion’ is actually fairly damaging.

I save boring stuff like moaning about DC, my periods or my cupboards for my mum and sister. With my friends, I attempt to keep the convos light, interesting and reasonably fun. Given the past few years, most people are emotionally drained. These days, when I look for friends, I look for radiators, not drains.

That's not to say one can't have deeper convos if time permits, but probably not about cleaning cupboards.

Introverts often make friends by being adopted by very dull extroverts - the type that will go into detail about cleaning their cupboard without any sense that they’re boring. These people adopt introverts because they don’t require true friends, they just need someone to talk at. An introvert is often more likely to allow themselves to be talked at as it removes the pressure for them to interact. It’s not ultimately satisfying though, and the introvert can become resentful.

I don’t think it’s friendship that’s exhausting, it’s just the people in your life at the moment. Perhaps get some hobbies with people with shared interests so you have better things to talk about.

@Clydagh

Start a campaign and I will bring a banner. I thought the continual misuse of ‘narcissist’ to mean ‘someone I don’t like’ was maddening enough, but the equation of misanthropy, shyness, poor social skills etc etc with ‘introversion’ is actually fairly damaging.

I agree. Not only is is maddeningly inaccurate and jumped on by every bandwagon jumper who thinks it makes them sound more interesting it is, as you say, damaging and insulting to introverts. It's my absolute pet hate at the moment.

Stomps off to draft a petition....

I apologise for misappropriating the word introvert 😊
I am most definitely an introvert though - and I guess because I know a few people who talk ‘at’ me like this, I assumed it was me that was the odd one out.
I have one friend whom I have had to stop seeing because week in, week out she would spend the entire of our time together talking about her problems - always the same ones, that could all be fixed by her simply telling people to fuck off but she just wouldn’t do it. I got frustrated with saying the same things to her and her not listening. Then she ended up turning on me, turns out that she was the problem and not all the other people she so vehemently complained about.

I don’t think that’s true at all. The only thing extroverts have in common is that they’re energised by social contact, just as the only thing introverts have in common is that, whether or not they enjoy socialising, they recharge alone.

Introverts aren’t any worse at making friends than extroverts, and nor are they more likely to be enthused by a recital of cupboard contents!

You need better friends. I am not an introvert- probably more extrovert than anything- and I only hang out with interesting people who make me feel good. Mostly.

Thing is, I do enjoy socialising when I am in the mood. I love a long conversation about stuff I find interesting as much as the next person but these days, I seem to find it harder to be talked at and just want to be left alone most of the time. Almost like someone talking at me this way is eating in to that ‘alone’ time and I’m just willing the conversation to end.

Thing is extroverts get "talked at" too. Everyone has boring or exhausting friends with whom they have poor boundaries. All people sometimes get tired or drained. You don't have to be an introvert to sometimes feel anxious or shy. It doesn't make you especially special or deep. And it doesn't mean anyone who bores you is automatically an extrovert. It's such unnecessary, binary pigeonholing when there's no need.

Amen to this.

Introverts often make friends by being adopted by very dull extroverts

I can see what this is getting it but (following the post above) I'd substitute "people who are too anxious to speak" for "introverts", and "bores" for "extroverts".

Oh I’m sure they do - I don’t mean to create a pigeon hole, I just thought that feeling this way about people talking at me was because of being introverted and that it was something I could ‘fix’
I feel guilty for not enjoying this type of conversation, is all. Im not trying to pit introverts or extroverts against each other and I definitely don’t think I am anything special.

Even the most interesting stories are a drain on my social energy and "spoons". I do genuinely enjoy the company of others but it has to be in manageable doses.
If I have a work event I book the next day off as I need time away from people to recharge.

When I was a child I used to hide at the bottom of my wardrobe to have a break from people.

“You may or may not be an introvert but you're bored and frustrated because your friends are boring. Not because you're an introvert”

^this^

I have many friends but only a few with whom I’ll have a genuinely engaging and flowing conversation with. Others I feel talked at and can’t get a word in, others go into the minutiae of how they got their kid to trombone class after swimming. It’s just a random list of what they’ve done that day and yes it’s boring. I don’t want to know that. I do want to know how folk feel or think but not get their itemised diaries minute by minute.

I get really pissed off when I ‘have conversations’ and do all the question asking, look interested, make the other person feel listened to but they just do not reciprocate. They ask no questions, they are on transmit and they do not pick up the social queues on how to have a conversation properly.