Do you enjoy socialising?

[ThankYouFansAndAirConditioners]

NC for this.

Like many of us, I've had very little social contact during lockdown. As an introvert I was fairly happy with that, though I've missed my friends and looked forward to catching up with them in person again.

Yesterday I went on a family outing - we're not in the UK and lockdown has eased here somewhat, though we're all still social distancing. We went to a family attraction and I was quite looking forward to it.

I was really bored. I didn't say anything of course, especially since we were mainly there for the children/grandparents and not for me, but a few times I found myself wishing I was at home on the couch playing with my phone! Not how I'd been expecting to feel at all.

Presumably it's going to take a certain amount of reacclimatising before social gatherings feel a bit more normal (and that won't be happening any time soon anyway, life is a long way from being back to normal). But I feel bad that I just somehow don't like people and don't want to have to spend time with them any more. I'm not feeling like catching up with any friends or going out to do activities in the future. I've never been a social butterfly but now I feel like I'm going to be a lifelong hermit or something. I don't like the thought.

Do you enjoy socialising? If so, what do you enjoy about it? What do you do? Is it fun?

Obviously for the most part I'm talking about that distant 'other life' we all used to have, but that we'll hopefully all be able to enjoy again someday.

I can't function without other people and if I felt the way you do I'd pronounce myself depressed. I always find things to talk about and other people's views fascinate me. I have been keeping in touch with friends during lockdown by phone, through voice messages and social media and I now meet more and more people face to face which is great. I would only not want to see people if I'm very tired, for example due to illness. I'm sure you have a very different personality than me.

I think there's been a fair amount of hunkering down over the last few months and it is quite difficult to get out there now. There's a certain safety about being at home.

Having said that, I think I would be bored at a family attraction too but would love to go out with a group of my friends.

I find most social gatherings boring so I pick carefully what and who I see. I’m happy to go if the people are interesting and good friends but I’m not bothered to sit drinking with idiots who’s lives I have no involvement with and no interest in. I’m not interested in wasting time with people that I won’t see or hear from for another year. I’d rather be home watching Netflix with a cuppa and chatting online with people

@BraverThanYouBel1eve you might be onto something there. I've been quite ill for a while and I think it's making me tired. I'm definitely not depressed, though I suppose I'm pretty stressed.

I feel really strange and unlikeable so much of the time. I'm scared to contact people because I have the feeling that they wouldn't really want to hear from me. I guess before lockdown it wasn't that big a deal because I had enough incidental social contact that I didn't really realise, but I'm now feeling terribly alone.

I don't enjoy socializing as much anymore , but that was before lockdown.
There is a family gathering coming up and I'm not looking forwards to it.
I'm ok when I get there but i still feel as if I want to go home all the time. I know it sounds very boring.
For me it's been the last five years or so I've felt this way and I'm sure the menopause is also to blame as well. For years I didn't go anywhere anyway , so maybe I just got into that habit of not really doing much? I find other people's conversation a bit tedious ( some family do like to talk about themselves! ) and we don't have a huge amount in common as it is anyway.

I know I need to snap out of it : I'm not down or depressed but as we age I think things become harder to do? Or it could just be me just preferring to stay indoors mostly now I'm ' getting on a bit! '

I am an introvert by nature but I love having my immediate family close to me and just being with them all the time over lockdown has been really wonderful. But my DH and kids are also introverts. So we understand each other. I enjoy casual interaction with people, like having a chat with a fellow dog walker or with someone behind a till. But mostly, I don't seek out chats with others. I chat if I am chatted to. I'm not a 'go out for drinks with the gang' person at all. I find it very draining doing the whole picnic/gathering/party thing and I sort of have to psyche myself up for social engagements, which, oddly enough, I really, really enjoy once I do them, but I need like 2 weeks of recovery after an evening with friends. It is how I am designed and there's not a whole lot I can do to change me now. If I'd understood this about me when I was younger, I probably would have been happier in my 20s. I felt like the world was sort of thrust upon me and I didn't know how to cope.
I do best when I am out in the garden with the dog or out walking the dog, talking to the kids. Because I am a rather smiley, warm person (not bragging at all!) who actually does like people from arm's distance , I tend to attract super go-go-go types who are constantly engaging with the world around them, constantly doing and seeing and talking. I attract the polar opposite of what I am. My warmth is mistaken for 'energetic', which I am not at all. So I end up pissing off these doers and goers and non-stop energy balls for people once they get to know me after a few months because they realise I am not like them and I am not out to change the world, start fires, or put them out. I just live life slow and easy. It's amazing how much this annoys a lot of people. This has made me even more of an introvert. I am afraid of disappointing people once they realise that I'm a just a random person who keeps myself to myself. I'm not the life of the party. I am also very tired at 48, with menopause on the horizon, and a bad heart (I've had a heart attack and have some damage). I've found a good balance though. I am able to compromise and meet people half way and socialise. But those who know me well accept that I will pull up the draw bridge at times and hole up.

I wonder what your childhoods were like? Are we born this way or do we develop into introverts as a way of protecting ourselves? I had loving, calm, wonderful parents but my dad had been in a concentration camp, so he was very fragile. I sort of lost my mother's attention and love to the needs of a drug-addicted brother. So my childhood was very lonely and frightening at times on account of my brother's violence. I retreated into my closet to hide a lot and write in my diary. I spent a good chunk of my childhood very scarred and battered by effects of drug addiction in a household.

I'm sorry- I sort of turned this into an 'all about me' thing. But to touch on your point, OP, yes, definitely coming out of lockdown for me (and DD who is incredibly sensitive) has been a bit like a diver rising to the surface from the ocean floor. Not easy! I feel like I need an emotional hyperbaric chamber. The school gates after lockdown were absolute hell for me. I couldn't face them. Nor could DD. We arrived late every day to school so that we could slip in through the office. Facing the crowd of parents was just too hard. And yet, we feel so lonely. I can't work it out. I realise how much I need people yet I feel so overwhelmed by them.

Interesting thread. I use to love socialising when younger but as I've got older (47 now) I find I enjoy my own company more or spending time with people one on one. I dont drink anymore and can find pubs very dull when people are getting drunk around me.

I never thought I'd feel this way as I used to be a real social butterfly. I'm happy though so not really bothered.

No - the Covid/lockdown thing has been such a blessing from this point of view. I live on my own, no DC, and since March I've been working from home. Bliss!