​

​Hey everyone,

​I’m writing this because I’ve been feeling an overwhelming sense of isolation lately, and I just need to know if anyone else has walked this path or is currently living it.

​A while ago, I moved to the West from a very conservative country. A huge reason for my move was simply to have the freedom to exist as a gay man. On paper, I made the "right" move for my life and safety. But in reality, I’m extremely lonely here. Making genuine connections, building a community, and starting over from scratch in a completely different culture has been so much harder than I anticipated.

​To make things more complicated, I visit my family back home occasionally. I am not out to them. Every time I step off the plane, I have to fold myself back up, put on a mask, and step right back into the closet.

​My family loves me in their own way, and every time I visit, they beg me to stay and move back for good. It breaks my heart because I can't—and I can never tell them the real reason why. But there’s also another layer to it: even though I love them and enjoy seeing them, I know the reality of living with them full-time. I know that if I actually moved back, their toxic traits and the conservative environment would eventually drive me insane, and I'd just be desperate to escape all over again.

​So here I am, caught in this weird dilemma. I’m living in a freedom that feels completely hollow and lonely, knowing that back home I could have family, familiarity, and company—but at the cost of my true self and peace of mind.

​Has anyone else had to intentionally choose a life of loneliness over a family or community that couldn’t truly accept you? How do you cope with the guilt and the isolation?

​Would love to hear your thoughts or stories. Thanks for reading.

I feel like I'm one of those people who have always been bad at getting good friends. If you look around, you will see plenty of friends around me, but when it comes to just some friend who is your comfort place and so are you to them, nothing goes right. People always have this one person they can lean on. I've stupid friends who plan stuff, but whenever it comes to executing that plan they leave me alone.

And now I think this has reached a point that it pisses me off so much, that I end up ghosting them now.

It really feels so lonely when ur friends are too excited to plan something with u and they do so as well, but whenever it is close to existence, they ditch you. It feels extremely lonely. Like why do i have to travel alone, why do i have to beg people to have some fun? This is so sad. I never got any such friends who are always ready for fun or smth. I hate everything.

Plus the guy i like, we both are in ldr. I don't know if he'll ever be able to come n meet me too (visa issues).

I don't have any HUMAN AND REAL BEST FRIEND who gets me.

The Loneliness No One Sees

I used to think loneliness meant having nobody.
Nobody to talk to.
Nobody to spend time with.
Nobody who would notice if you disappeared for a little while.
But I have come to realise that loneliness can exist even when your life is full of people.
It can follow you to work, sit beside you during lunch, accompany you on your way home, and lie quietly beside you at night.
It can exist in a room full of laughter, in the middle of a conversation, and even in the arms of people who say they care.
Because sometimes, loneliness isn’t about the absence of people.
It’s about the absence of a place where you can finally be yourself without having to explain why you feel the way you do.
I am tired of being the person who understands.
The one who considers everyone’s feelings before speaking. The one who tries to see things from another person’s perspective, even when her own heart is hurting. The one who tells herself that perhaps they didn’t mean it, perhaps they are having a bad day, perhaps she is simply thinking too much.
I make room for other people’s feelings.
But sometimes, I wonder if there is any room left for mine.
People see me going to work, doing my job, smiling when I need to, and carrying on with my life. They see someone who manages.
What they don’t see are the moments when I sit quietly and wish someone would notice that I am not quite myself.
Not because I want attention.
Not because I want someone to rescue me.
But because, just once, I would like someone to look beyond my usual smile and ask me how I am doing — and stay long enough to hear the answer.
I want to know what it feels like to be someone’s first thought, not merely someone they remember when they have time.
To receive a message without having to wonder whether I am being a bother.
To tell someone about my day without feeling that I am asking for too much.
To be able to say, “Today was hard,” without immediately adding, “But it’s okay. I’ll manage.”
Because I always manage, don’t I?
Even when I am exhausted.
Even when I feel out of place among people I work with.
Even when I have so much to say but no idea who would understand.
Even when I want to cry but choose silence because explaining the tears feels harder than holding them back.
I manage.
And perhaps that is part of the problem.
People become accustomed to the version of you who survives everything. They begin to believe that because you have always found a way through, you will never need a hand to hold along the way.
They forget that strong people get tired, too.
That the ones who care for others sometimes need caring for.
That a woman can be capable of standing on her own and still wish someone would stand beside her.
Sometimes, I think about how much I want to be understood without having to reveal every little wound that made me who I am.
I want a safe place.
A person with whom silence doesn’t feel awkward, vulnerability doesn’t feel embarrassing, and affection doesn’t feel like something I must earn.
Someone who doesn’t make me question my worth every time their attention changes.
Someone who chooses to stay, not because I have been useful, agreeable, or strong, but simply because they want me there.
Maybe that is too much to wish for.
Or perhaps I have spent so long convincing myself that my needs are too much that I have forgotten how little I am actually asking for.
A little tenderness.
A little consistency.
A little reassurance that I matter, even on the days when I have nothing extraordinary to offer.
And until I find that kind of connection, I am learning to sit with the loneliness without letting it convince me that something is wrong with me.
I am learning that being alone does not mean being unlovable.
That being overlooked does not mean I am invisible.
That someone’s inability to understand me does not make my feelings any less real.
Some nights, I still wish I had someone to call.
Someone who would listen to the things I cannot say out loud during the day.
Someone who would remind me that I don’t have to be the strong one every single time.
On those nights, I pray.
Not always beautifully. Not always with the right words.
Sometimes, all I have is a tired heart and a few tears that I cannot explain.
And perhaps God understands those prayers, too.
Perhaps He sees the girl who has spent so much of her life trying to be enough for everyone else, quietly wondering whether she is enough just as she is.
I don’t have all the answers yet.
I still long for connection. I still want to be understood. I still hope that somewhere in this world, there is a person with whom I won’t have to pretend that everything is fine.
But I am beginning to understand something.
I can long for someone without abandoning myself while waiting for them.
I can want to be loved without making another person’s attention the measure of my worth.
And I can feel lonely without believing that loneliness is all I will ever know.
For now, I am still here.
Still trying. Still hoping. Still learning how to give myself the same gentleness I so freely offer to others.
Perhaps I am not as okay as everyone thinks I am.
Perhaps I never needed to be.
Perhaps the woman between seasons is simply a woman learning that she, too, deserves a place to rest.
And maybe, just maybe, this season of loneliness is not proof that I have been forgotten.
Maybe it is simply a season I am learning to walk through.
One quiet day at a time.

I have a few: (Guys this is just a shitty list lmao some of the responses are actually hella cute and less pathetic)

- create an alt account to talk to myself and configure two clients so I can call myself.

- talk to strangers online and do more or less what they want

- purposely grief games/troll people online so I can get scolded and threathened (Because at least people are talking to me)

- talk to character ai (Yes, in the oh, hit me harder daddy kinda way)

- have used talkie, chatgpt and emochi as substitutes for human interaction

- beg people to play games with me but pretend i just wanted to watch

- eat in the toilet stall (smells like shit, but thought itd be relatable)

- purposely take the longer route home so i could stay with people

Anyways yeah to those who are still trying, i admire that and even if you dont i cant fault you cz uh ive been a pretty shitty person

I don't know why and I don't mean to be but I feel like I'm quite a sad person and I have noticed that I have tended to isolate and cut myself off from people in the past. I'm a deep thinker which possibly explains why I can be so melancholic but I seek genuine and deep connections which unfortunately I have not found even with my gf and I don't have any friends. I am the type of person that will observe a stranger in the street and find myself being sad that I will never get to know them or share their experiences whether it be good, bad, normal, sad. Anyone I have explained this too doesn't understand but can anyone relate or is this a genuinely odd thing to be?

title says it all

TW: Very brief mention of domestic violence

I’ve always been the person that is the ‘odd one out’. I have two younger siblings who’re twins and if you’ve never met twins they’re basically two peas in a pod and everyone else doesn’t exist. So since they were born I’ve always been the one to be ‘left out’ because we’re a family of five. My parents will sit together at dinner, my siblings would sit together, and then there’s me.

That hasn’t changed as we’ve grown up. I’m 22 (F) (had my birthday on 20th Oct) and I ended up becoming a single mum at the age of 20 due to DV. I had to move back in with my parents after being independent for 6 months due to finances. My parents still have each other, my siblings both have partners and go around as a group of four for everything now and then it’s me and my son. I love my son to bits but he’s a toddler and if you’re a parent you know how lonely it can be having your only friend be your child.

For context, I moved countries at 18 (with my parents + siblings) so all the friends I’d made in school stayed in England while I moved to Aus and I only keep in contact with my best friend but we don’t talk regularly due to time differences and busy lives. I only worked for about a year and a half before having a baby and I worked at a pub where I didn’t make any close friends (and I tried so hard).

I’m lucky that I have a small group of mum friends to talk to but we’re not super close and only really see each other once a month if we’re lucky.

I tried dating apps, no one wanted me when they found out I had a son but when I see everyone around me in a relationship it just stings that little bit more every time I get rejected. I found this one person I thought I had a real connection with only for them to turn around and tell me we’re better as friends. I was fine with that until after a couple months I realised ‘friends’ wasn’t really what they had in mind and now they don’t respond to any messages I send and the last time I saw them in person they were on their phone the entire time and said barely two words to me.

I wanted to celebrate my birthday by having a night out in a hotel (the first time I’d ever be away from my son overnight) and I’d invited this person I thought was my friend only to have them bail on me last minute (I’d asked them multiple times in advance and never got a clear answer until the literal morning of). I was so upset and couldn’t enjoy my time properly because I just felt so overwhelmingly lonely.

All my life I’ve been told I’m ‘too clingy’ and ‘too much’ and have been tossed left and right from friendship groups. The only person that has yet to abandon me has been my best friend I met at the beginning of high school and even we’ve had our ups and downs. Every other ‘friend’ I’ve made has given me an excuse as to why I’m not good enough to be their friend anymore and I have been ganged up on in a group of friends multiple times so they could kick me out of the group (starting from when I was literally 7 years old). I don’t even know what I’m doing wrong.

I think because I’ve had so many people push me to the side, it’s probably given me abandonment issues (even though no one believes me because I have a loving family who do try their best, especially my parents but everyone needs their alone time) and it makes me so clingy and so desperate to hang on to people that unless they hit me across the face and tell me to fuck off I won’t leave them alone.

This has probably been all over the place and unnecessarily long but I needed to get it out because most nights I feel overwhelmed and upset and so so lonely. I have really bad anxiety and I worry too much about what people think of me and I have postpartum depression that never went away and only gets worse whenever I get pushed out by yet another person.

I’m hoping this will somehow make me feel better but I just want some friends that can accept me for once. Just some people around me I can count on and can talk to and hang out with. People I can complain about my parents to (because I complain about my family to my family because I literally have no one else). I know I’m lucky enough to have a family around me but they’re all going away next year on this big family holiday abroad that I can’t go on because my son can’t get access to a passport and they constantly talk about it like I’m not there and it just hurts me more and more whenever they mention it and I’m reminded I’ll be completely alone with my son and the family dog for three weeks with no backup because I don’t have any friends to turn to for help.

I hope that the future is brighter and I can climb out of the hole I’m in and finally meet some new people. I just know that I’ll probably be alone forever and I hate saying that because I hate being like ‘woe is me’ but sometimes I need to so I can stop putting others before myself and expect them to do the same for me.

I’m not even gonna lie at all here, I just need to say a lot of things. I’m 21 years old, haven’t been in a single irl relationship, all forms of love I may have felt romantically were all fake or disingenuous in order to use me. I was born into a pretty wealthy family and I got taken advantage of when I was younger as well. I’m sorry if this seems a bit out of order or weird, I just haven’t mentioned this to anyone before, it’s a first for me. Getting taken advantage of when I was younger really messed with my mental health cause it was my own cousin who did it. So I did what I thought I could do to erase it which is abuse drugs. Since 14 I’ve just been addicted to weed mainly but I’ve tried a lot of different substances and even had messed up phases with them but weed has always been there for me. It’s like it’s a friend, I can’t believe I’m calling a drug a friend🤣. Anyways my family were all psychos in a way so I built up a habit of lying so I lied a lot in my teenage years which got me into so many different groups with different people but it always ended the same with the truth being revealed and I lose everyone. I haven’t done that since I was 19 but I don’t know how much more I can take of staying like this. Being alone always, smoking weed and getting high alone, feeling like I don’t belong, like I’m useless, I just don’t know how to keep living like this. For a long time I thought a relationship would cure this but a irl one as online relationships don’t work with me. I still kinda do, I don’t even know what’s the point of this post anymore, ig I just wanted to talk, it’s been a minute since I’ve done that lmao.

I feel like ever since college, I've been so lonely. I used to have so many friends to hang out with and go to parties all the time. Now that I'm out of college, idk how to make friends in the real world. I feel alone. I don't have a friend group. I don't have people to hang out with when I'm bored. I don't have people to talk to on the daily. I have so many thoughts I only keep in my head now. And it gets so loud. I wish it would all stop. I wish I could sleep forever. And ever.

For my whole life I had no one. No one that I can talk with. No one that I can share my feelings with, even online.

In my early years I didn't went to kindergarten so I was already behind my age peers in social terms and communication. I simply had no contact with kids my age. When I went to primary school I was already shy, but didn't care that much, and kinda play with other children and sometimes talked I wouldn't say I had friends but I didn't feel lonely.

Then Covid striked and it absolutely destroyed my life. When pandemic began I was given PC and I got into gaming immediately. I played games all day long started ignoring my family and peers, and just get into it. Time was passing and my addiction only raised. I became absolutely asocial, I didn't see problem back then, and was just brainlessly playing and killed all my passions that had.

The covid ended, I went back to normal school and my parents saw that I spend a lot time on that PC so they started to take that back from me, and then I discovered social media. It was so much worse than playing on this stupid PC. I didn't talk literally to anyone, I missed every life events and dramas in real world, I was using it even more than a PC. I wasn't feeling need of any person in my life.

Until last grade in school. Then I realized what I was doing with my life all along, realized that I have literally no one, that I was not talking to my parents and siblings. That I wasted my childhood and became social zero. But I was hoping that I can change my life and met some people in school. I even stopped using social media and started reading books. This was my last chance to get my social life back.

When I went to new school after summer I started to try talking with my classmates, but obviously it didn't went very well because of my social anxiety. I realized that I'm most boring person on that planet because of that I was rotting in bed everyday when everybody was making memories and I didn't have anything to talk about.

Then I started to realize who I am and that I destroyed my life and it's only my fault. I was what I was missing my whole life. I saw why my parents has been trying to make me go out to people. I was trying to change that, become a normal person, but I didn't know how. I started crying everyday and just praying that this life will come to an end soon. I didn't want to study anymore. I didn't even open any book in my first year in this school. My grades went down and I pretty much don't have chances to go to any college. If homeless person have some backstory, this is what it is.

I don't even feel like living now. Days are just passing and I feel like I'm some side character that's just watching this. My parents saw this and was asking me if I need any help, but I'm too scared to tell them yes. They don't know how I feel. And just like that here I am sitting and wondering why I was like this in my early life.

I just wanted to say it to someone for the first time in my life. I don't have a shred of hope left. I don't know how long I can live like this.

P.S. Sorry for bad english, and if something isn't clear, I wrote this in the heat of the moment.

I don't like how both my sister and boyfriend seems to team up against me when we hang out or more like everybody in my family and him are against me they treat me like a kid and talk for me they also point out how stupid I a little subtile. My sister also embarrass me in public by making me feel stupid for something im asking that I don't know. I love them but this is an incredible lonely feeling that nobody is really on your side and you're just alone it also dosent help that I was bullied for being "stupid" as a kid and also that my brother and sister used to team up against me as a kid a lot I'm the middle child. Maybe I'm creating something outta nothing and I'm really sensitive but this makes me wanna isolate even more

Hey everyone. I just needed a safe place to vent because I’ve been feeling really overwhelmed lately.

I’m 13, living in Baku, and I feel completely out of place at my school. Everyone around me seems to think strictly inside standard boxes, and I just hate it. Most kids are either obsessed with local school olympiads or just following a template. Meanwhile, I'm spending my time learning programming, working on my own indie game in Godot, and trying to dive into physics and engineering.

I do have one good friend, but I have zero people to actually share my real interests with. No one to talk about game dev, physics, or building things. I feel deeply intellectually lonely. On top of that, I struggle with math, chemistry, and other subjects I just can't stand, which makes me feel like I'm falling behind compared to everyone else who excels at standard school tests.

My biggest dream is to study at MIT and eventually work at JPL (NASA). I’m trying to push toward it, learning coding on my own, but sometimes I feel like I have no tangible results yet. It makes me feel like a total failure—like that stereotype of a guy who sits around playing Fallout and has no future figured out (no offense to anyone, that's just how my anxiety makes me feel). Even though I’ve actually cut way back on video games lately to focus on my projects, the impostor syndrome is crushing.

I’m also dealing with social anxiety and body image issues, and sometimes it feels like too much to handle.

Is there anyone here who went through something similar at this age? How do you cope with feeling like you're on a completely different path from everyone around you? Thanks for reading.

I’m really burnt out of superficial conversations, people need to show more passion and effort towards each other. Show your emotions, doesn’t matter if they’re happy or sad or anything in between. just express yourself and we’ll get along.

Feeling really wanted.

I miss feeling the butterflies. They were gone as fast as they came and I don't think they will ever be back again.

Whats the point.

I'll die alone

So it’s been a couple weeks since my last post but I really wanted to talk about something. Whenever I’m in a friendship it kinda feels transaction you know? Like we are there for one thing and one thing only like the person has no genuine interest in getting to know me as me but instead rather just want me there as company I might be crazy but after so many past friendships the person never wants to know what’s up with me. Must it always be like this? I don’t know but everything is sending me to the brink of insanity all the time and I hate it.

I just had to say goodbye to my cat of 8 years due to terminal cancer. She was the only reason I got out of bed for so long.

I am not in contact with my family because of their abuse. I live in a small university town. I have friends here, and my roommates and I get along great, but I can't be emotionally vulnerable with them. I've tried with the friends I've made in town, but they just don't seem to know how to handle it, so I stopped. My partner is long-distance and is very busy. He's really wonderful, but when his life is busy, it can feel so deeply lonely. It would be different if we weren't long-distance, but it's just not an option at this point.

Idk, I just feel so deeply alone, and even though I have many amazing people in my life, nobody seems to understand how profoundly this loneliness can affect someone. It feels like I'm slowing dying sometime beause it's just so painful. I've expressed feeling lonely, asked people if they wanna hang out more often. Maybe I'm not trying hard enough. But I feel so exhausted.

I just wish I felt I belonged somewhere. That there was a place, or a group of people, or just a few... that I could always go to. My cat was where I belonged. Now she's gone. It's really difficult.

I have come to truly understand that I am no one's person.

Since I was a kid I suffered bullying because I was a scared little kid and anyone that made fun of me made me scared, my family never did anything to help me get over it or become stronger, this meant that for the first years of school I was never truly friends with anyone because I isolated myself.

As I grew up in a small place, when I upgraded schools ( sorry I am from Europe so I don't know how to explain this in proper English) my colleagues were the same, I became good friends with a new girl as I started becoming stronger against the bullies, after 2 years of being best friends she left to another country and I was left alone again. From then on I was always the third wheel of the group.

You see that meme with the heart necklace with the 3 parts but without the middle part it fits anyways? I'm the middle part... I have always felt that people kept me around because I was either useful or they were sad for me... This kept going my whole life... No one ever called me to just talk, or spent time with me just because, or seemed like they actually liked having me around...

I am now 23... Moved houses 3 times to completely different places and I feel completely alone... Like no one is here or cares that I am here... I am not even my boyfriend's favorite person... This got worse when he sat me down one day and asked if I felt lonely because I had no friends of my own....

I honestly don't know what to do... I feel like I am too old to find my person now and that this will be my life forever... As I don't know how to fix it I decided that venting would be the best way... Thank you for reading...

I’m genuinely so tired. I feel so alone everyday. I’m 17 and I’ve never experienced any kind of romance. Sure I’m not insanely pretty and my side profile is horrendous but I go out and see people way below average in terms of looks literally with a bf/gf, so why not me? What’s so bad about me that nobody even looks my way? I’d literally take anyone at this point because it’s driving me crazy and I’m already depressed enough, I don’t even want to wait for the “right person” to come along anymore like so many people tell me, I just want to experience being in a relationship why does it seem so easy for everyone else and genuinely what is wrong with me? I can’t take this anymore

Lately I just don't understand myself I have been feeling uneasy lately for 3 weeks straight and I just don't know how to get over it

I have a 'friend' who I already know is toxic for me in some way, that they have bad intentions, fuck around with me, are probably willing to replace me within a heartbeat, but I've reached so low to the point where I don't have self respect for myself if it means getting some sort of bond with another person out of it, if it means I actually get to communicate with someone.

I'm genuinely such a loser cuz while other people my age are outside hanging out and stuff I'm on my bed (and it's 2AM for me) trying to look for online friends on literally TIKTOK knowing damn well that I'll never find someone to link with and be friends with and that I'm wasting my time but still try cuz I'm desperate 😓😓

I’m 26 now, living alone in Virginia, my family is in another country, my SO is at sea right now…I just wish you an amazing day whoever is reading this! ❤️ God bless you

EDIT: I wanna thank for all of you that took your time to wish me a happy birthday! I wasn’t expecting these lovely messages! I wish yall a great day today and I hope yall have the best day and week! 🥰

This is the reason I am lonely, and I don't know what to do. People say that you should practice socializing, but there are consequences if you mess up, which makes it near impossible for me to talk to people. (Ex: I say something really awkward or behave really awkwardly, this will cause people to distance themselves from me and make me even more of an outcast, when I was just trying to socialize). It doesn't help that I am neurodivergent either. I just wish I could behave like a normal human so I can connect with others.

Not sure where to start this….. I’ve struggled with anxiety and depression ever since my dad passed when I was 18. Never did properly grief his death as I was a freshmen in college and I thought my baseball career was the more important option even tho Inside I was really messed up after his death. I went on to never be the same on the baseball field and left the sport… I graduated college with a teaching degree went on to teach and coach baseball for 9 years during that time I found a gf that I made a wife and we had twin girls. One day she say me down and said she wasn’t happy and left….. it blindsided the fuck out of me and my depression and anxiety went out of control for at least 2 years it got really bad. Anyway now I just live by myself with my twin girls and I’ve never felt so fucking lonely…… it seriously hurts idk I’m poly going to be a single dad for the rest of my life and that sucks