Does anyone not fit in and is at peace with that

[Notreallynormal]

I have a handful of close friends who I have known for years. They are separate friends rather than a group and don't live nearby so i only see them occasionally.

That aside I really struggle to click with people. I am aware work colleagues find me irritating but to be honest I find I have little in common and am less bothered about being liked than I used to me. I spend time with them trying to be more like them and get a bit worn out and do have times of thinking there is something wrong with me. There are a couple of colleagues I don't do this with who I really like and relate to. But mostly it's quite wearing.

With my old friends I feel accepted as myself, never feel anything other than I love seeing them. But because they don't live nearby I do miss company at times - yet feel so different to others.

I wonder if others relate. And how to manage. I was thinking maybe I need to find a class or similar so I have come company with a focus.

I hope the neighbours let you get a peaceful lie in this morning!

Yep me, I don't fit in. I wrote a long reply but I lost it and haven't the energy to repost. I grey rock the world and am loving it. I don't think anyone here was being unauthentic and it's a shame the comment police arrived. Have a peaceful Sunday

Yes, adding my name to the list of folk now giving themselves permission to detach from the world. I had to, basically as my health had fallen off a cliff by age 50. Spent 5 decades trying to fit in and didn't. I can't live with people either - apart from my lovely daughter - so I don't fit in with couples. I'm one of those long term single folk that a lot of the world view with pity and suspicion.

I also get what folk are saying about not liking e.g. Strictly and therefore not really being able to fit in / do small talk etc. It's more than the general awkwardness of not liking small talk. It's knowing that you're different and barely like any popular culture. I had to give up on this there is very little common ground. Usually goes like this for me:

Did you see x on Strictly? Wasn't she fab!

• Oh sorry, I don't watch it.

What do you think about the new Bake off series?

• Oh sorry, I dont watch it.

Did you enjoy Game of Thrones / Walking Dead / That thing with Cillian Murphy?

• Oh sorry, I really didn't like the look of any of them.

Which is your favourite Harry Potter book?

• Sorry, I've never read the books or seen the films. (Same with Disney films)

Do you fancy coming along to a girls night out with the school mums?

• Oh sorry, I don't really socialise and I don't drink.Thank you very much for asking though.

I get that I'm making myself sound like an arse to most folk. I just have very little in common with most people. What I do like would probably bore them rigid. And so it is much less stressful to just not bother after the agony of trying for years. I still try and be very polite. I love my own company and the peace that affords me.

Btw Purplemonkeys, you actually tick quite a few of the main categories for Neurodivergence - largely Social / Communication and Sensory like me. I was diagnosed ASC last year. I deliberately haven't tagged you, just thought I'd mention. Made sense of my life.

I don't fit in, but in an opposite way to lots of previous posters.

I think I am liked at work. I work in a technical environment, where people take their work seriously. So all I need to do is smile, be helpful, and leave people in peace to work, and they will like me. I feel relaxed and myself at work.

Outside of work, I am rubbish.

I am actually not dreadful at small talk, but I find it hard to get past the small talk stage. I have had close friendships in the past, but they have drifted when friends have found more fun people to spend time with.

I feel like if I am authentic, it is dull and obsessive and that drives people away. If I am careful about what I say, I am reserved and inauthentic, and never get beyond acquaintance.

So, I have lots of shallow interactions, but nothing deeper.

purplemonkeys

Im not putting words in your mouth - I’m telling you how you’re coming across in the things that you say - whether you agree or not you do come across as very angry and just hateful of people in general. You seem to think you are perfect and everyone else is anti-social scum. Obviously if you give off those vibes people will find you hard to talk to. I just think it’s a sad way to live your life to walk around so filled with hate of other people and ultimately just damaging to yourself.
I actually relate to a lot of what you say and get very irritated by other people myself however in order to exist in the outside world we sometimes have to swallow our feelings and be polite. The charity worker may be annoying for instance but they are just trying to do their job and earn a living. You sound like you massively lack empathy for other people. Someone would have to be a major dickhead in order for me to tell them to fuck off. It’s just rude and unnecessary. You could’ve just walked past and said nothing, job done. My dd18 has done collections for charity and I would hate to imagine her being spoken to like that whilst simply trying to do her bit for those less fortunate than herself.

And as for the noise, if you live next to a busy road or in a very urban area you are obviously going to have to tolerate people going about their lives around you. I live rurally and it would be my idea of hell to live in such a noisy place such as you describe.

Hopefully you will find your future solitude in a camper van is everything you dream of 😊

I firmly believe that everyone feels like they don't fit in. They just have different strategies for dealing with it.

Can I ask from thise of you who don’t fit in?

Do you date/have a relationship/hook-up/have kids?

Absolutely not asking because you shouldn’t, but I’d like to know if not doinf these things have made feel like you don’t fit in and/or how going about these things have been like when you don’t fit in (I assume you mean you aren’t ’normal’ or like most people).

I always feel guilty about this.. I never fitted in when my kids were young and I think they really missed out. While most parents were building relationships with other families which have lasted years, mine had to make their own friendships which was fine for my dd, but ds is reserved like me and now as an adult, doesn't have any childhood friends.

Yes we have relationships and friends, usually with people like ourselves. When you click with people you really do click with them. In group settings it feels like you're behind a sheet of glass , and I feel uncomfortable . I just can't do petty drama . I find great peace in solitude .

that sounds lovely 😍

Honestly, you seem to be encountering a very limited type of person. ‘Most people’ I know would have answered as you did (my only ‘yes’ to any of your questions would have been to the HP books, because I read them to DS), but these are all people with lots of friends, not people ‘detached’ from socialising. You aren’t at all unusual, you don’t sound like an arse you just seem have decided what ‘normal’ is, based on a very limited sample, and that you’re not it.

The parents I occasionally go out with at night who have children in DS’s class are a mixture of drinkers and non-drinkers, men and women, and include a archaeologist, a former nun, a musician, a forensics policeman, an architect, a couple of students, someone who runs a circus skills school etc. Never, to my knowledge has there been a discussion limited to TV.

It’s just “low minds”.

An undiagnosed condition but v unpleasant. Especially found in small towns and some offices full of average women (my experience anyway). They can be a grim, nasty little bunch - often hateful or jealous of anyone who seems different or free-spirited; they hate true sensitivity and have a fundamentally ugly spirit; they want to firmly want to put anyone they can’t control or understand firmly in their “place”. Best response: distance yourself big time from them if you can!

Yeah, sounds lovely 😊good 🍀

Away from the narcissists, Karens, Debbie downers and busybodies eh?

Send us a virtual postcard 🤭 ?

Well, now I’m curious what everyone think ’not fit in’ means.
I would assume that if you date/have kids, you are and are seen as perfectly normal and accepted around people and you should feel like you more or less belong, since you are like everyone else.

The underlying sneeriness on these threads always comes through.

I don’t like, let alone do ‘petty drama’ either.

This has nothing to do with fitting in?

Agree. I felt uncomfortable about that Karens and Debbies post.

I genuinely find it hard to 'fit in' without feeling disdain for others.

Yes. People wonder why they don’t fit in, while being very sneery, and even downright derogatory about other people.

There’s your answer. You don’t want to fit in. Alternatively, if you do - then consider giving Other People (they’re not some foreign species) the benefit of the doubt, or doing what everyone else does, which is put the work in getting to know them, and enabling them to get to know you.

Again, if you don’t want to do that, just admit it, and carry on with not fitting in.

This post is not directed at every person who’s said they don’t fit in on this thread - just FYI.

I feel I don't fit in, all the time.

When people get to know me, they usually like me but it's getting to know them that's the issue and finding out who I get on with. I've been described as "odd" and "quirky" before and I know some people struggle with it.

I'm also a bit ADHD and I wonder if this is part of it sometimes.

I feel I don't fit in, all the time.

When people get to know me, they usually like me but it's getting to know them that's the issue and finding out who I get on with. I've been described as "odd" and "quirky" before and I know some people struggle with it.

I'm also a bit ADHD and I wonder if this is part of it sometimes.*

I could have written this.

I think I've been afraid of people for most of my life. Probably started when I was bullied at school for not being attractive. I have been called a weirdo and a misfit because I am so quiet, but I am quiet because I have been too afraid to go out and do things - so I have fewer things to talk about. It's a vicious circle I suppose. I don't hate other people. The people I really like would never want to be friends with me because I'm ugly and boring. I really am. I am a pathetic excuse for a human being. I'm not after sympathy btw, I'm just being honest about it. People are swayed by looks more than we want to admit. I'm basically too ugly to go out, and too ugly to be accepted into a friendship group.

Another neurodivergent person here and I totally get what so many of you are saying. Never had a close group of friends. Fringes of several groups - yes but always on the fringes. Friendly enough with most people. But never fitted in, at home, work, clubs, etc.

Sometimes I see other groups of friends meeting for coffee whilst I'm alone in a coffeeshop and I wish I had some of that "close girl friend group" but thinking about it further - I actually don't! Socialising, talking about other people, Strictly come dancing or whatever else on telly, is hard work and really boring to me. I like my own company. The agency to do what I want to do without feeling like I need to make other people happy.

I love sewing and crafting but I've stopped going to knit and natter groups because it drove me mad that people did far more nattering than knitting. Absolutely nothing wrong with that, it's just not for me.

But throw me with a stranger who's a passionate musician and we can chat for hours about different aspects of our instruments. In fact, I've booked a retreat away (my first in 9 years) about an hour from home, alone, in the quiet and I cannot wait.

And people think quietness is a weakness- oh no it's not , as many have found out .

The difference, Cecil, is that people like you seem very bothered by the opinions and attitudes of people like us (despite not affecting you on the slightest). While the majority os us, "non-fitters" have leaned to not give the sligtest flying fuck about the opinions of people like you, a.k.a. "the fitters". We are happy not fitting and it's a massive relief not to have to put up with fitters' neuroses and constant concern about what others think or do.

I'm ok with being mainly introverted, i don't always want to fit in.

I used to want to fit in. I saw women with tons and tons of friends, and I wished I had the confidence and charm for that.

As I've aged, it doesn't look the same to me. They're not friends, they're "friends." Now, I have a few people I'm close to and that's ok with me. I have several friends that I barely see, but the moment we're in the room together, it's like we've never been apart. There's always stuff to talk about, and sometimes there's not and that's ok too, we can just hang out and be together without talking. I have real friends, the kind you text at 2 am and they show up with a shovel and a trash bag. 😉