Not sure if this is the right place to post but it's a good one for sympathetic advice, so...
I suffer from social anxiety and in consequence lead a very solitary life (not in the UK, by the way). I've brought up my DD, now 18, with some help from her father, who finds being sociable much easier than I do—but he didn't help nearly as much as I'd hoped in terms of taking her out and making sure she spent time around people, though the two of them get on well.
When she was about 15 she got depressed because she hated her school, but at first insisted she'd stick it out. After a year I couldn't bear it any more and neither could she and she agreed to swap schools. She did well academically and made new friends (one of her original reasons for not switching schools was that she'd have to make friends all over again; she is shy, though not as shy as me, though her father likes to insist she's perfectly confident).
One thing about her friendships, though, is that a lot of them were conducted entirely at school and online. Also she has few female friends. She would happily go to a party or gathering if someone else suggested it (and go in alone—I'd die!) but there were only two people she would ever invite to visit our (perfectly presentable) home and then only rarely.
Anyway she started at uni in the UK this term and at first seemed to have made friends with a few other international students and her flatmates (she lives on campus). But now she's complaining about not being able to sleep—she got two hours sleep on Thursday, for instance, and worries about sleeping through her alarms, and gets up late so she can't go for a run in the mornings as she'd started doing (which of course also affects her mood).
We were talking yesterday and it seems basically she doesn't do much except study, cook and shop for necessities, all of that alone as far as I can see. I'd hoped she'd do the things you can do in a big city and go out with friends sometimes. But she stopped seeing the international students (who are on a different campus); and now it seems she and her flatmates only hang out if they happen to be cooking at the same time; and she says she talks to some of her classmates but they're not friends. She had started looking for yoga classes but says the ones on campus are for beginners & classes elsewhere are too expensive. She runs by herself when she can, and isn't the sort of person to join societies or hang out in a student bar—she won't do it if she's not interested in the activity, and doesn't get it when I say the point is to meet people.
So it seems she's only just managing and I'm worried about her getting lonely without even knowing it—because as I said her upbringing was so solitary—and getting depressed again (the sleep thing really worries me). I don't want to suggest more therapy because I don't want her to think there's something "wrong" with her.
If I try to suggest other activities I'm accused of being a helicopter mother.
But I really wanted her to enjoy the experience of student life and city life, not just plod through it alone doing necessary tasks (which is pretty much how my life is & more or less always has been).
Her father suggests she's a happy introvert (I don't know what that's like: I think I 'm a literally hopelessly shy and hence lonely and miserable extrovert) but she doesn't give the impression of being especially happy, and I think he's also trying to dodge any responsibility or having to try to help. If I try to talk to him about her he usually laughs at me for making a fuss about nothing.
Am I worrying too much/over-identifying with her, or spotting signs that other people wouldn't because I've been there myself? Is there anything I can do to help? Especially at this distance? I thought of e-mailing her with some suggestions for getting out and meeting more people and also making her aware of what student life can be like at its best, but she may just resent that or it might make things worse if she feels she can't manage it.