To want to just avoid people as much as I can until I die now

[OptimismvsRealism]

Sure there are still some great people out there but most are awful stressful thick rude shovey mean argggg

Friends can still come to me but no outside

@Thepeopleversuswork

As you eloquently put it, "social muscle" is something that has to be exercised.

There was a study somewhere which showed that human beings need to interact with each other in smalls ways on daily basis to facilitate good mental health. Just a hello to a shop assistant, or holding a door open for someone can make a difference to our dopamine levels. But these interactions are becoming less and less, online shopping, wfh, supermarket self checkout etc.

I like the micro interactions I have with people just being out and about. When you're smiling the whole world smiles with you is spot on.

I notice myself if as I am indoors more often during winter my tolerance for others goes down.

I see people in the gym all the time, let themselves go for a decade or two and now a long road to get back. It's very easy to slip into a long term mindset like this that it's easier just not to bother, but our minds and bodies were supposed to be put to use.

I think the nation would benefit from a mandatory 3x a week 30 minutes group exercise. Investing massively in leisure facilities and encouraging group sport more and more would massively improve the declining mental and physical health of the nation and save the NHS money.

Horses and dogs are precious, and loving and intelligent. (As are cats, and many other animals and birds etc...)

But I think it's worrying and sad that you prefer their company to humans. That's not normal. The company of animals and nature is wonderful. Exhilarating and intoxicating, and I get a huge dopamine hit from interaction with nature. But dismissing humans, and only wanting the company of animals is unhealthy and unnatural ...

@SabreIsMyFave

I completely agree about animals. I am a huge (dare I say obsessive) cat lady, I can’t overstate how much pleasure I get from my cats and I firmly believe that pets help mental health massively.

But wanting to spend all your time with animals with far less intellectual capacity, who are essentially only motivated by fulfilling basic needs and who can’t communicate verbally in preference to your peers is a sign that something is not right.

This is quite a sad post. I feel sorry for people who struggle relating to others.

I don’t think it’s technology but a combination of things including germ theory gone unchecked that has made people more socially atomized

Who the feck are you to instruct people on what is normal? Aggressive teamsters like yourself are the worst subtype.

I have a small dog, and she's an absolute delight.
Quiet, unobtrusive, gentle- Son is an adult now and has own house, so I live with my lovely dog {she's lying under my left arm at this moment}

Why have an irritating partner like so many do when you can have a lovely cat or dog for company?!

{Living with a partner is cheaper, for sure- shared bills} but pets are easier.

{I do get on with ex husband now}

But your children are the stinking rot OP is talking about . As her children are to you.

A previous poster suggested OP is depressed and I tend to agree with that. The levels of rage described in response to life’s minor vicissitudes are definitely not in the normal range.

The last think I would say is, as a more extroverted socially comfortable person, growing up in this acid is a really horrible experience. It isn’t really possible to give the message to children that all other people like them are worthless, and hope you can save them from internalising that you feel that way about them too.

Why?
Having a few 'good' friends is better than wildly socialising- and living with an animal is easier , especially when one's DC are grown up.

@Thepeopleversuswork

I completely agree about animals. I am a huge (dare I say obsessive) cat lady, I can’t overstate how much pleasure I get from my cats and I firmly believe that pets help mental health massively.

But wanting to spend all your time with animals with far less intellectual capacity, who are essentially only motivated by fulfilling basic needs and who can’t communicate verbally in preference to your peers is a sign that something is not right.

Exactly. It's far from normal, and suggests some underlying issues. I think these people should seek some kind of therapy. I actually feel quite sorry for them with the way they are dismissing humans in favour of animals.

@OptimismvsRealism

Who the feck are you to instruct people on what is normal? Aggressive teamsters like yourself are the worst subtype.

Sounds like YOU are the one getting upset and angry mate, not me as you suggested earlier. Calm down..... Go grab a snickers, you're not you when you're hungry.

@oakleaffy

Why have an irritating partner like so many do when you can have a lovely cat or dog for company?!

Gorgeous dog you have there, but that is just such a sad and depressing sentence. Animals/pets are amazing, but no replacement for a human companion. Not long-term.

I had my mood massively lifted by a lovely man who held a heavy door open for me {My hands were full}, It was such a thoughtful thing for him to have done {it really is a beast of a door, inward opening and hard to pull}.

I did tell him he was a lovely man

I agree- small kindnesses really do a lot for people.

Today, another kind bloke told me I'd dropped something - again, really grateful as I'd have been massively inconvenienced by losing what I'd dropped {again, carrying too much in my arms}

OP, I wish I didn’t feel the same, but I do. I feel comforted by this thread - that I’m not alone.

I just don’t enjoy the company of many people anymore. I work from home now, and honestly, my life is much less stressful. That said, I feel really sad for my lack of community. Growing up in the 80s, we had lovely neighbours. We had parties for big birthdays. The kids all played together. We wanted to be with each other and have a good time. Now we only want to go on a city break and take pics for insta. PR ourselves to no end.

When Brexit happened, I just felt shocked by the outward hatred shown in plain sight. So many people outing their opinions, naively thinking they are in the company of people who agree with them. There was just so many. Then all of the bullshit Governments, Trump. Trillionaire money hoarders. The far-right protests. The wars and the people supporting them.

Then the cost of things… A college degree is as an expected as a GCSE these days. It’s £800k for a 2-bed terrace in Hackney. You need to be a millionaire now to have the same living standard as a 80s street sweeper. Yet so many people just buying stupid crap.

I just don’t want to know about it anymore.

I have friends- but just wouldn't want to live with anyone else again in the same house.
Have seen two friends {Human!} today.

@oakleaffy

Having a few good friends is better than wildly socialising.

Maybe. That’s all fine and that’s how I prefer to roll but it’s not really the point.

People on here who self identify as “introverts” often posit the idea that everyone else is out six nights a week getting shitfaced in bars, dancing on tables etc.

No one is suggesting that: I’m certainly not. It’s more just being open to people as opposed to assuming they are all bastards, as the OP apparently does.

But you are engaging with people just by being on the internet….😉

I’ve recently had this discussion with DH venting on about something he heard on the radio. I reminded him he brought this through our gate, it wasn’t here before he heard it on the radio so leave it off if it angered him so much.

The only people whose company I actually enjoy are my grandsons, all under 8 years old. And I really love my dog.

The irony is lost on the OP. Too angry with everyone who breathes to see the hilarious irony of their posts, and how disingenuous they're being!

But you are engaging with people just by being on the internet….😉

It's funny cause the people agreeing with her are people OP would look at with contempt if she passed them on the street.

No! Just prioritise those you like as interacting is so beneficial. I used to think I couldn't meet any more nicer people than I had but it keeps happening, so many wonderful people out there to make a positive impact. Yes there are a lot of arseholes, you don't have to be their friend, acknowledge they're awful, not part of your life.

Withdrawing from life, one will become so intolerant, insular and basically sad? I do feel I would like to just have some time to just be on my own, retreat from the world, not possible due to family and work. If I get the odd day I can do this I love it but look forward to companionship and grounding.

I get you, so much conflict, cruelty, harshness in the world. We all feel the powerlessness of it all, even the stupid shallow trends and shallow aspirations.

But we do need to have friends and mutual affections, which aren't the same hovelled up in a bubble online.

I understand if very introverted etc but there is a whole world out there to explore, have experiences with, explore and learn from.

Heck I just want to meet new people and travel the world until I pop my clogs - and shall be wearing purple 😃

That's fine but the OP has gone way beyond this to out and out hating people. It's one thing to not want to go out all the time, it's another to shut yourself off.

So true!
As a teenager, I had a squat in the East End- a condemned house owned by the GLC.

It was meant to be demolished.

I lived in one room in the house, a front room with wooden shutters {Original}
Loved the house, it was like a time warp, people had left loads of old stuff inside it from 1880's onwards.

There was so much more 'community' then.

I googled the house {168, Swaton Road, London E3} and instead of being demolished, it had been refurbished {the cracked retaining wall rebuilt}
and the price! £720,000 in 2021
Pic is of the front room- {Rightmove} it had dark wood window shutters {now painted} when I lived there, but loved that room!

Lived there for free as did many on the road - it was famous for squats back then. Council owned bomb damaged houses.
Richmond upon Thames had squats too- and Notting Hill had loads!

It wasn’t that fantastic. You just know all the bad stuff faster these days. And you had to interact more face to face in 1982 as no internet so it was better as an old person then.

We still had war … and Thatcher,
Was it more dangerous then or now? Really? No CCTV for example so crime far less traceable.

I do think now I’m older I have very little tolerance for rude, obnoxious, thoughtless people and I do feel sorry for teachers etc who deal with kids never off social media. Good manners are thin in the ground since Covid I feel.

Early 1980's were so different.
I would love to go back to that era.

There was Thatcher, but health service was still reasonable, and far less people and cars on the road, even in London.

What is massive now is how people in cafés or at playgrounds or elsewhere are transfixed by their phones.

In the past, everyone had newspapers, but no longer, one hardly ever sees people reading papers in the train or bus any more.
{Metro apart, but that is a comic}

I mean, I thrived in lockdown and love wfh - would describe myself as a fairly hardcore introvert. But I went out for a meal yesterday and had a brief but v pleasant chat with the elderly lady sat next to me. She didn’t seem like a dick. And the taxi driver made me laugh on the way home, he didn’t seem like a dick.
much as I object to relentless and forced social interaction and have opted out of much of it I really don’t recognise the world you describe op. I’m sorry for you that you find it all so hard.