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Anyone else feeling desperately lonely despite "managing OK"?

26 replies

PasserbyEffect · 01/06/2020 23:16

I do have friends and family flooding their Facebook pages and What's App groups with random rants and harmless chatter. I do Skype weekly with my parents, and Signal every few days or so with my sister. I do enjoy plenty of family time with DH and our two DCs. I do keep in touch regularly with their teachers, and with my work colleagues, through various electronic means...

I do feel terribly lonely still. I thought working from home would be a nice break from office politics, and I sure don't miss the commute, but I guess I do miss the whingy gossips and laddish comradeship of my (ridiculously male dominated) workplace. I'm finding (socially distanced) random small talk at the supermarket till strangely uplifting.

And I'm tired of putting up a brave face at all times, but I don't want anyone to worry or feel bad, and I'll brush my feelings aside and instead go and check everyone is OK, and try to crack a joke or say something cheerful to make them smile, or pretend I know what I'm doing so that they can feel reassured things are under control, and offer helpful advice to feel needed...

... Anyone else? If so, what keeps you sane? Do you just bottle it all up, or do you have people in your life you can truly open to and lean on? Do you feel compelled to act all grown up and responsible at all times even though you feel confused and vulnerable? Or do you just let the mask slip and show your true feelings, warts and all, safe in the knowledge they will be accepted and you won't lose the love and respect of those around you?

Aside from that, I'm OK, honest...

OP posts:
nordica · 08/02/2021 14:15

I live alone and generally enjoy being on my own... There was a discussion on TV the other day about the sort of casual, brief meetings we used to have with other people in the course of our daily lives and I think that's exactly what I notice I miss the most. I think they referred to them as the relationships that exist on the periphery of our lives. Just exchanging a few words with someone in a shop or cafe, or starting to say hello to someone over time because you see them nearly every day on your walk home from the station. There aren't many of those encounters in my life at the moment.

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