What pushes you from liking someone to actively getting them into your life?

[ToGoBoldly]

Hi,

What the thread title says, really.

I'm really struggling with feeling isolated and lonely. I've felt like this all my life, but it's been really intense recently so I have been feeling even more low than I ususally do.

I have a handfull of friends but no one really close, and they are all kind of fairweather friends. They've all kind of retreated away from me into their own lives, which is fine, I accept people grow apart, but it feels like everyone in the world has a network of friends and a partner, and I am being left on my own. I try really hard to get out and meet new people and stuff, but I feel like I am constantly rejected and it is really, really difficult to bear.

I have been doing some work on my feelings around this with my therapist and have been asked to drill down on why I believe I don't form close bonds with people. I can only think that people don't like me enough - they don't dislike me, but they don't like me enough to actively want me in their lives. It's as simple as that. She's tried to suggest I might be familiar with the feeling of rejection so kind of invite it, but I really don't think that's true. I try really hard to go out of my comfort zone with people - I am shy but friendly, I invite people to things, I make the first move, I volunteer myself for things, I am generous, I'm laid back and not pushy... but none of this seems to count. It feels like plenty of people think I am nice enough but they don't want or need me as a close friend. I don't blame other people for this - no one is obliged to be friends with everyone - but I just feel like everyone chooses people to be in their lives, but no one chooses me. And I've really hit a wall in trying to work this out.

This post sounds really needy and whiny, I promise I am not like this when I am trying to make friends or boyfriends! Like I said I am having counselling (for various things) but we've kind of reached an impasse on this one.

I've felt like this forever. I felt it at primary school, at secondary school, at university, at work, and in my love life. The only way I could explain clearly to my counsellor was how I felt it at primary school, so their behaviour is clear, not because they are horrible children but because they don't try to hide their feelings. But you can see more clearly with kids how people naturally gravitate towards those they want to be friends with, and that often is the really pretty girl, or the boy who is really good at football or whatever. I don't think things change a lot as an adult, it's just more subtle. And I don't think anything bad about people who have those who gravitate towards them and want to be their friend, but I just feel really sad because it feels like no one naturally gravitates towards me. It makes me feel really unloved and depressed.

I try to be proactive, no matter how many knockbacks I get I try to carry on with life and try new things, but it's really overwhelming. I asked my counsellor what she thinks I could do differently, but she is either stumped, or wants me to work the answer out myself. But I really can't think of anything beyond "people don't like me enough", which is their prerogative, but really hurtful when it feels like I'm not good enough for anyone I've met in my whole life.

So I guess I'm trying to bash out these thoughts a bit more. Am I just hideously unlucky that I never seem to meet people at the right time for them to want to pursue a friendship or relationship with me? Or what is the magic ingredient that makes people want to move things forward? I feel like there is a locked door and people will smlile and wave at me through a window and think "there's that woman, she's nice", but they won't ever invite me in, if that makes sense.

I am sorry if this sounds quite immature and self indulgent

waahh, all this abstract and emotions talk is making my rational brain run for the hills! I sense this is going to take some time...

Mind, muscle memory can give you gyp as it blindly goes along old patterns..

ok, done with that analogy, promise. I mean that old and established patterns can resurface and it can be an ongoing discipline to reframe what was fucked at a formative time.

I don't think it ever comes entirely naturally to run along healthy lines when our programming was fucked at the outset. But we can do a lot, a great deal in fact, by addressing and reframing the original injury/s and learning new and healthy patterns that become part of our lives and do get embedded and endure.

is making my rational brain run for the hills!

Good! That's the ticket!

But my rational brain is my only friend

No it isn't. YOU are your friend - but she got cut off way back [cry]

Ah MN, I have missed thee!

I've been thinking about the self-soothing repetitive practises - just goes to show how sore we are. Everybody does it, of course, ('normal' people ) but we do it more than most? Shelter from the storm.

Re your dancing: that could be indicative of YOU. Yes you use your head, your rationale, when doing it - but there's more to it than that, no? Not soothing repetition so much in this case but something core going on?

Work - MN broken - now work again. Will catch up with the thread this evening! Oh, morning all.

Yes Springy, I definitely think there is something in that. It's kind of getting into a zone, and I can't possibly think of anything else when I am dancing. I never did any exercise when I was young! I guess it's kind of like people feel when they are running. It's repetitive, you're completley in focus but completely zoned out all at the same time. I feel amazing when I am doing it but it's always such a temporary feeling. Within an hour or two the euphoria is gone.

I was reading a lot about PTSD last night. It's exhausting. . I crashed out on the sofa while reading. I don't know how to word this, but I can't work out why, if things were supposedly so bad, I managed to function at all? I can't get this straight in my head.

Ha! Me too! It doesn't make sense I'm still functioning. Quite well, actually. How come??? It's a bloody MIRACLE.

But, hey, scratch the surface and it's quite obvious something is not working properly, something is 'broken'. I've done a lot of work and I'm not quite as broken as I was but the scars will always be there.

I work a lot with the homeless and (talk about 'but for the grace of God"!) I recognise a lot of the brokenness, saddened there was just too much of the bad stuff from every side and the whole shebang collapsed.

On that note: we had some of the good stuff to the point we can function. That's something to be grateful for.

springydaffs

That skeleton metaphor is a really good way of looking at it. The one difference is, of course, that the brain is capable of regrowing and adapting in a way the skeleton isn't. And it sounds like your therapist uses the same style mine does, compassion to others leads to compassion for the self and vice versa. A virtuous circle.

ToGoBoldy I keep getting William Shatner trying to correct me in my head every time I type your name :)

But even if I start doing what the textbooks suggest and get angry at anyone who has ever abused me or neglected me or whatever, it won't change anything.

My feeling is this - we've all become so used to being told how to feel / being forced to feel a certain way / not being allowed to have the feelings we were perfectly justified in having as children, we now deny ourselves the same freedom. Following that advice is allowing oneself to experience the emotions that are (incorrectly) flagged as being wrong, inappropriate or a waste of time. It's self-empowering and other people have respect for the self-empowered.

Have you seen Jacob's Ladder (probably not)? There's this amazing line:

Eckhart saw Hell too. He said: The only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of life, your memories, your attachments. They burn them all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. So, if you're frightened of dying and... and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth.

Of course, what we're holding on to is our past. The demons are our feelings and they tear at us because we won't let them do their job. We turn them into anxiety, we reject them, we negate them and we down-play them. The only way to reach inner peace is to understand that our deeper, true feelings are actually trying to free us from what came before. The first step is to make peace with your past, and that may require being really fucking angry about what happened.

ThisIsStillFolkGirl

I'm sorry you're in such a bad place. I've been where you are and I promise you it can get better.

I feel like such a failure though. I know how people with MH probs are talked about by professionals who don't understand it (and there are many). I don't want to be talked about like that.

You know, it doesn't actually matter how MH professionals talk about you. They are not the judge of you! The point of therapy isn't for them to understand you (which they can't), it's for you to understand yourself on an emotional, not an intellectual, level. IMHO you need to stop rationalizing what they say to you and start focusing on what you feel about what they say (and by 'feel' I don't mean 'I feel patronised'!).

The unconscious, feeling, sensing part of the brain seems to me to work on a different set of rules than the rational, conscious minds of people like us. The unconscious mind may not be the best set of tools for understanding physical laws or such, but it's evolution's solution to the simple question: how do I, as an individual, successfully navigate an incredibly complex social environment. If you're formulating a new equation, you want it to be correct for all cases. This is impossible in social situations. Instead, you just need to be right most of the time and to know how to make up for when you're wrong the other 10%. I think we so fear the 10% of being wrong that we deny ourselves access to the unconscious understanding that allows us to be right 90% of the time. This leaves us with a rational thought system that knows how to be right 100% of the time: avoid the problem.

Just off out but my therapist/s have not so much in fact never encouraged me to have compassion for others - the unequivocal focus has been compassion for ME. My compassion for me, predominantly

It follows that, plumped up with compassion/love for myself, I have a lot more space to survey the landscape and beneficently confer forgiveness recognise that holding on to unforgiveness hurts ME. I've been hurt enough, thanks. (Anger/rage/outage/etc doesn't mean unforgiveness, just to clarify). It's very much a natural progression at the end (ish) of the process ime but inappropriate during the process imo - that's the time for monumental, appropriate, rage, blame, grief etc.

But Intheprocess, what if you avoid the problem because whenever you have confronted it in the past, you have had a 100% failure rate, or near enough?

I think it's easy to say "some you win, some you lose" if you have wins to soften tge blows. But if all you have ever is failure and rejection, it's not so easy.

For example: I'm 31. I've never had a proper boyfriend. Ever. No one can say that isn't unusual, and many would say it's a sign of someone a bit odd, and there must be something thay puts people off. And it's not because I didn't want one. It's just no one picked me in life. I try really hard but I can't break down barriers, so it's just more and more rejection every time. It makes it really difficult to feel like you fit in the world if you can't find people who will accept you.

I don't know if I'm socially deficient or socially stunted or what, but ... I don't know. I've been trying to articulate this for hours

Hi ToGoBoldly (and springydaffs)

Gah, up too late again.

I've had 'proper' relationships, but they did me more harm than good :(

I should re-write the post I've been putting together (in reply to springydaffs) but am to tired now.

All I can say is that I've been subjecting myself to a 'shock and awe' emotional awakening and have allowed myself to feel all sorts of things about a lot of bad parts of my past and present and I'm now more 'me' than I ever have been. It's making me a better person, and, I think, a person who is more likely to attract people who are good for me. I basically reached a point where releasing my 'inner emotional self' was the only thing I hadn't tried. Circumstances have meant I haven't had time to plan it out or get myself ready, or do it in any kind of organised way. I think that's been a good thing. In quiet places and times over the last few months there have been tears, there has been lots of swearing, lots of sadness and some regret but, increasingly, happiness too.

I'll write more when I have time!

I haven't had the difficult childhood experiences you've had but have always found it difficult to make friends. Felt totally alone whilst i was bring up my children.

Strangely enough I am now finding, in my 40s, that it has become much easier. This is because i have joined various groups and taken on organising roles - everyone seems to want to know the organiser - who knew?

I'm a quiet/shy person but somehow I've taken to this role and it is a role which I kind of play, although as time goes by it becomes more natural to me. Some of the people I've met this way would now consider me to be friends; for me it will take longer for me to view them as my friends. And I think the labelling of people of friends or not friends isn't always helpful - we have peole who come into our lives - why do we need to label them?

Things that have helped me establish better relationships over the past few years are:

• not sharing personal stuff about myself until others do so - so keeping it light and fun. Personally I find sharing very easy but I know it puts people off me.

• not offering to help people all the time as was my tendancy.

• not inviting myself along to things unless its clear people are telling me about something as they'd like me to join them. This includes not muscling in on other peoples transport arrangements.

• mentioning things I'm doing to people I can see are trying to establish a social life/friendships - I just give them the details; I don't offer to meet them/ transport them/ get them tickets - but if they go along I'm friendly and introduce them to others.

This way of being has radically changed how people view me - people now approach me; invite me to things. I hear them talking about me as a popualr person who everyone knows!!!!!!!

Is there a cause/ sport / activity / committee you could involve yourself in and play a role? Not exactly acting, more fake it til you make it.

Hi Verity, thanks for posting. A lot of what you say makes sense. I follow your rules by and large, I believe. But I struggle to get past the basic niceties stage with people. I'm sure plenty would consider me a "friend", but wouldn't prioritise me if I needed them. And I understand your point about taking on a role, but the trouble is I feel like I have been trying to fake it since my teens or earlier, and I am never going to make it. I've joined committees, done voluntary work, joined a political movement, been to cultural events...but I just feel like a bit part player.

I joined a dance group and had been going for the best part of a year and thought I was getting somewhere with people, it was fun and it was light and they seemed to like me. I had a birthday coming up and invited them to my celebrations, they all said they'd come but they all flaked on the night. About 10 people. I am so used to people dropping out of commitments they make to me that I was wholly unsurprised, and I still enjoyed myself, but I couldn't help but feel that familiar feeling of not being anyone's best offer, and that stings. Especially when the better offer people take isn't even someone else, it's doing nothing. I don't feel like people cna be bothered to make an effort for me. I'm nice, but not friend material. I'm nice, but not girlfriend material. It's the same all the time and it's lonely and exhausting.

Train of thought from Verity's post...I never muscle in, but I'm finding it hard to see what the balance is. Be proactive but not intrusive, don't expect other people to do all the legwork but don't let people take advantage of you as organiser. You have to open up to people emotionally to let them in, but don't share too much of yourself emotionally as it will scare them off...

I never meet people and tell them within a couole of weeks "I was abused and emotionally neglected as a child" or indeed anything personal, I know they would run away in the blink of an eye. In fact I have never told anyone the half of it, bar someone who ended up extremely controlling and using that knowledge to his advantage.

I can't remember where I was going with my last paragraph.

I realise I sound a bit intense but I don't do this outside the confines of an anonymous Internet forum

I had the worst counselling session today. We were almost arguing and I feel so drained and upset. I don't have a session for 2 weeks now .

This is so hard. I was talking about how I still don't see how me inviting people to my birthday, or inviting people to my house, or asking people out, or whatever is "inviting rejection because it's what is familiar". I'm not inviting rejection, I hate rejection, I didn't ask to be familiar with it and don't think I invite it.

And I don't see how "loving the child within you who so tragically missed out on love at the time" will make anything better. Hey at least I will love me, no one else bothers.

I feel like shit

bloody hell I've found a thread full of like minded people .
really must go to bed for now though

Oh that's tough that you have to wait two weeks for the next session. Is it usually weekly?

Believe it or not, 'arguing' in therapy is good, beneficial work. Doesn't feel like it at the time ... she lies, I love a good ding dong but only if I feel safe and that someone important to me will weather the storm and will still be there at the end of it. Ime of therapy it is a very good sign when I start arguing/getting pissed off bcs I am being challenged, my cage is being rattled. It's good to shake things up bcs, let's face it, i'm only there bcs my carefully laid plans aren't working. Something needs to change - only I don't know what it is. Which is why I'm there!

Alright then, if you don't currently want to go back and love the child who was so heartlessly bashed about, can you love you now? You may not be able to manage the whole love thing but you could view yourself kindly: as someone who is hurting a lot and has had crushing disappointment after crushing disappointment. Could you hold her a bit? Say something kind and reassuring to her? Treat her to something? Encourage, congratulate? Bcs by your standards you are doing well, you would respect someone who is working as hard as you are to get things right. You deserve a pat on the back - could you give it to yourself?

Hi springy,

Yes it's usually weekly.

I am kind to myself when things go wrong and give myself props when they are due. This does not make people like me.

She can't give me a convincing reason for why she believes I invite rejection, i gave tne example of when I invited ten people to my birthday, all said they woud come an all dropped out on the night. This was not that long ago. I asked how this is courting rejection, bearing in mind it's one example of many. She said "I see how that was hurtful". Yes of course it was hurtful, that's why I feel so unwanted and alone. It has half of fuck all to do with my childhood, yes shitty things haopened to me then but shitty things are also happening to me now, I'm not bloody asking people to treat me badly. I really don't know what I'm supposed to be doing differently.

ToGoBoldly, my sympathies. I'm supposed to be doing some inner-child work with my therapist now and it just makes me cringe.

Intellectually, unlike you, I can see the connection between my state now and how I was treated then.

But I still don't see how comforting an imaginary me from decades ago is going to transform or indeed alter in any way the external facts of my current situation, which are, objectively, unpleasant.

OP - shit happens; people let you down (let me down). How about stopping focussing so much on these relationships and focus on something else (leave the flakey tossers to flake without you). Maybe train for a marathon; emerse yourself in a cause; do some sort of extreme challenge for charity - Great Wall of China or whatever - something you can control - that's all about you.

Round my way there are drop-in Samaritan centres, or mh drop-in centres, if you want to offload in the two weeks? It can help to talk to a fresh face.

As it happens, I went into therapy bcs I thew a party, invited 70+ people and 6 turned up; 4 of them left together after half an hour, fleeing the rejection pile-up. I was crushed. I had handmade the invites ffs. I had informed all my neighbours my house would be rocking into the early hours and to please bear with.

I could laugh now bcs my life was teeming with hideous problems but it was that resounding rejection that got me into therapy. Only I had no idea my life was boiling with problems - I was used to them and had been my whole life. I simply didn't see them.

By the law of averages, discounting the arseholes and the flakes, bad weather, ill dog etc, that was a very high number or rejections. There was no getting around it. I now see through post-therapy open-eyes that my friends were not my friends at all; had made it very clear, over and over, they were not my friends. Only I was blind to it bcs rejection and being treated badly was what I was used to from childhood . I had no idea it wasn't normal.

I'm not talking about outright treated like shit but those people - across a number of social circles - had all subtly, though very clearly, made it obvious, in myriad different ways, i was not valued by them. As I had never been valued I didn't see the gaping hole. That party smashed it into my face and I had no choice but to see it.

It is a mark of my ignorance and blindness that I set myself up to that extent. I chose those people, across the board: they constituted my entire social life. I had to conclude my social life was shit. I was so surprised! I had no idea at all .

In therapy I got to see what had gone into me making those disastrous, guaranteed rejection, choices. Once it was all dragged out of my subconscious (which had been ringing bells, blowing whistles and shouting for years to get my attention: which I doggedly ignored, to the point i didn't even know i was ignoring it i was so blind and deaf; preferring my own, rational, version: I'm a nice person, anybody could see that) . once it all came out it was blindingly obvious. A relief, actually.

What does it matter if you don't see why you should 'go back and love your inner child'? Why not try it and see what you get out of it?

Hi Verity. I don't disagree that those things are good to do. I do things for me all the time. I do plenty of activities, I travel (but even that is hard when you have no one, single supplements are a bitch and I am by no means loaded), China was on my list actually. I learn languages, I learn new skills, I've conquered some fears, I have done charity work.

I've lived abroad, including one of Europe's most beautiful cities. I found it really hard to meet people, as usual, but was conscious that I needed to enjoy it all the same. So I went out to all the sights and on excursions, I tried to immerse myself in the culture, took photos of scenery, asked strangers to take photos of me on my own. Most of my travels have been like this. Yes it's lovely to see new beautiful places, and appreciate natural wonders (I've been moved to tears by a waterfall), but then I have no one to tell my experiences to, no one to show my photos to...

If I did a charity trek I don't think I would find people to sponsor me. I did consider doing something and making a donation myself but it just feels so sad. But that's not your point. I get your point, but I've done loads of "experiences" and "activities" but I still feel like I am lacking.

I love cooking. I've been on several courses for it. I've learned new skills and really enjoy it. But you do these courses and get to take the fruits of your labour home, and I think "oh shit, I've got no one to share all this food with". I have all these cake skills but no one to lovingly make a cake for. I make some for work sometimes. I'm great at cooking but if all I'm going to make for the rest of time is meals for one, I lose all motivation.

Running is not my sport because my joints have issues, so a marathon is unlikely. But I do other physical activity and set myself goals - that is purely for me and it fulfils some need for growth and whatnot, and it fills some time. It's something I decided to take up a few years ago when I was feeling lonely (just after one incident that I've mentioned on this thread, in fact). I had wanted to do it since I was little anyway, so I finally went ahead and did it. I'm still doing it years later, for several hours a week, and I feel the improvement and sense of achievement. It's creative, it's good for my body, it's some time out from the daily slog of life, it's a distraction.

But that's it, it's a distraction, not a cure for how I feel.

Humans are supposed to have social interaction. I'm not a goldfish. So I can keep busy with sport and classes and travelling until I'm exhausted, but I will still feel empty inside. No one owes me friendship or a relationship, no one is obliged to be my friend or lover. If I don't have a family so be it, not everyone has kids or other family. But if my life is going to be working and dancing, with a solo holiday or two every year, and a pottery class here snd there, it feels so, so bleak and I don't know if I can bear the thought of it being like that for the next 50 years or however long I live. I just don't feel like I'm supposed to be here. If I can't have interaction with people I don't feel like I am valued, nor do I add any value to the world, so what's the point? There is no intimacy, I don't feel like I belong anywhere and I don't think anyone would even notice if I were not here. Life, when you have no one to share the good and bad times with, is pretty shit.